


Shut My Mind, but I See You

by sigo



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Armitage Hux Has Feelings, Armitage Hux Smokes, Canon-Typical Violence, Darth Tantrum and his Evil Space Ginger, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, Kylux - Freeform, M/M, Not Beta Read, Pre-TFA, Protective Kylo Ren, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:27:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 24,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23239933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sigo/pseuds/sigo
Summary: Kylo was nothing if not a consistent disappointment to his masters. All it took to bring him low was copper hair fisted in a hand that wasn’t his, the sound of a laugh rough from disuse wrenched forward twice in one evening, the glow of white bare feet against black carpet in the starlight. That was all, and now he could no more crush Hux’s windpipe than destroy his grandfather’s helmet.
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren
Comments: 30
Kudos: 275





	1. Possession

**Author's Note:**

> Hux and Ren falling together over the course of TFA. Rated Explicit for sexual content in last chapter. TW --- Hux is threatened with assault by an original male character, and there is discussion of previous coerced sexual contact with that character.

Kylo Ren stalked across the bridge, his mind latched on to General Hux’s force signature. The man had ignored 5 digital meeting requests, direct summons from a terrified trooper, and even Kylo reaching out through the force. His efforts to connect were met with a curt  _ out of my head _ and a raised shield. It was just like Hux to bitch for months about how he was never briefed on Kylo’s missions in a timely manner and then to be unavailable the moment Kylo made time for his demands. Hux was entertaining an admiral this cycle in preparation for his descent to Starkiller, and had made a habit of ordering the sectors of the ship they occupied clear of troopers as he filled his temporary replacement in on the workings of the Finalizer. For this reason Kylo hadn’t even bothered with his helmet. His hair drifted back away from his face as he rapidly neared the pinpoint of Hux’s mind. The admiral’s own force signature was next to Hux’s, as expected. No matter. Hux would dismiss the man to avoid Kylo making a scene. Kylo turned the corner, and stopped as if struck.

Hux’s fiery red hair was in disarray, catching the white light and glowing, strands falling forward into his face. This was fundamentally wrong. Hux’s hair was always slicked back with a ruler-straight part, enough pomade worked through it that the teeth marks of the comb lingered. Kylo’s eyes traveled down. Hux’s face was blank, eyes closed and mouth soft. There was a blotchy feverish flush on the high points of his cheeks, unusual in the chill of space. The high collar of his uniform was undone and the tunic was hanging open, exposing the white column of his throat and an inverted triangle of his chest. This was more of the General than Kylo had ever seen before. More of him than Kylo would have guessed anyone aboard this ship had seen before. But here was Admiral Drayson too.

Drayson was a graying, sharp-featured Chandrilan man that had been close to General Hux’s father before the Commandant’s untimely demise. He was still done up completely, but had backed Hux into the console. As Kylo watched, yet unknown to the two men, Drayson clasped Hux’s gloved hand and drew it to the bulge in his own jodhpurs. “Mm,” the older man murmured. “Maybe your hand isn’t enough this time. Maybe I ought to finish on your pretty face. Send you back to your quarters like that.”

Hux’s face remained blank. He didn’t open his eyes. It was as though he hadn’t heard.

Drayson continued, voice rough as he guided Hux’s hand over himself. “They say you’re a cocksucker. That’s how you got this station so young. Maybe we finally put your mouth to use, huh?”

Hux opened his eyes at last, and they were glacial. “Handjobs. Gloved. That’s our agreement.” He said it as though he were discussing a components list for repairs.

“I think you owe me more,” hissed Drayson, “for keeping your little secret.” He released Hux’s hand and drew his arm back. A stunstick slipped out of his sleeve and he punched Hux in the stomach with it. His other hand clutched Hux’s shoulder, driving the General to his knees as he convulsed from the electric shock. Then he fisted Hux’s bright hair in one hand and began to fumble his fly with the other.

Kylo saw red. Admiral Drayson froze, emitting a small choked sound, and then both of his hands scrabbled wildly at his neck as his body fully lifted off the ground and slammed into the ceiling. “My co-commander deserves more respect, Admiral,” Kylo ground out through his teeth, thinking,  _ how dare you touch what is mine. _ Freed, Hux fell to his forearm and coughed, clutching at his stomach. He rose slowly, blinking as he used the console edge to pull himself up to standing. He saw Kylo.

“Ren?” He said, and coughed again.

“Are you all right, General?” Kylo asked, trying to soften his voice and barely succeeding, concentrating hard on keeping Drayson’s throat closed as the man choked loudly above them.

“Fine,” Hux murmured, finally looking up. Hux studied Drayson’s purple face a moment before beginning to straighten himself out, doing up his uniform and brushing his hair back with his hands.

“I want to kill him,” Kylo said.

“Why?” This was slightly muffled — Hux asked it through his gloved hands as he lit himself a cigarette.

“He attacked you.”

“You attack me. Regularly.” Hux breathed a stream of smoke out.

_ That’s different.  _ “Let me kill him.” Kylo’s voice edged on pleading but he couldn’t bring himself to mind. His skin crawled at the thought of what Drayson had been about to force on Hux. Rage seethed inside him, marbled by dark-hot-gleaming veins of possession he’d previously worked to ignore and would not examine now.  _ Mine, mine, mine. _

Hux gazed up at Drayson, eyeing his shaking and gasping body a minute longer, taking a drag of his cigarette. He turned to Kylo and nodded. Kylo’s blood burned, white hot and righteous.

“Get behind me,” he said. Hux did without argument.

Kylo squinted up at Drayson, whose throat was raw from his gloves grasping at hands which didn’t exist. Drayson’s skin, already mottled red and purple from asphyxiation, began to bubble. His left eye burst, blood and viscera hitting the durasteel floor with a smack. His uniform sagged and dripped dark fluids in places as the hall echoed with cracks and sickeningly wet pops. At last Kylo crushed his larynx and let him drop to the floor.

Hux blew another line of smoke over Kylo’s shoulder and Kylo turned to face him. “That was quite the show,” Hux said mildly, though his pallor betrayed his shock. “What was all that noise? Bones?”

“Ribs,” said Kylo. Hux nodded slowly. “I burst his testicles too.” Kylo added. “One at a time.”

Hux snorted at that, and then chuckled, mouth quirking up in a genuine grin. It was lovely, Kylo thought. His heart clenched like a fist. “You’re welcome,” he said, fighting hard to put an edge in his voice.

Hux rolled his eyes. “Really, Ren, I shouldn’t have humored you. This is too much trouble. Snoke won’t be happy with you for killing an admiral. And look at this clean up.”

“He attacked you,” Ren repeated. “I defended my General. Snoke will be pleased. Here,” Kylo stepped close and reached out a hand toward Hux, who barely flinched. He was always meeting Kylo head-on even after witnessing the depth of his power. Kylo ghosted his hand over the fabric of Hux’s tunic, right where he sensed the lingering sting of the stunstick.

“That’s cold,” Hux said.

“It’s almost done...there.” Kylo withdrew his hand. “Take a deep breath, clench your abs. Is all the pain gone?”

“Oh,” said Hux, twisting slightly to check. And then, voice just barely warmer, “Yes. Thank you.” He tossed the end of his cigarette at Drayson’s oozing corpse and tapped at his datapad, summoning a clean up crew and notifying the Supreme Leader that Ren had neutralized one of his officers. He turned as if to stalk away and then looked back at Kylo. “I have a bottle of Corellian brandy in my quarters that I’d been saving for a special occasion. The demise of that waste of atmo certainly qualifies. Would you like to join me?”

Kylo hadn’t been in Hux’s room before. He wasn’t sure what he had expected, but it wasn’t this...emptiness. There were precious few personal possessions here for a man who lived on this ship full time, who Kylo knew considered this his home. His quarters were nearly as sparse as Kylo’s, all furniture and fabrics regulation standard. The only difference was that Hux had a large transparisteel window set over his bed — the bed was pushed all the way into the far corner with two sides against the walls, just like Kylo’s, he noted. Stars winked by in the dark expanse outside. The center of the room was devoted to a large swirling hologram that could be made to display any documents Hux required. At the moment, a schematic of the Starkiller plans glowed ghostly blue there. Hux had designed every piece himself, and even now picked at his creation as it was being built. Refining it.

His desk was to the side of the entryway, and Hux stepped over to it to set down his datapad. He briskly stripped his leather gloves off, exposing his pale hands. Kylo’s eyes raked over them, filing away their details. They had the same fine bones the rest of him did, fingers long and elegant. His nails were cut to the quick and filed smooth. He deposited his greatcoat on the back of his desk chair next, exposing his thinness in his tailored black uniform.

“If you don’t mind,” Hux said, interrupting Kylo’s hungry observation of him. “I’d like to change. Send this uniform for cleaning. Make yourself comfortable as well. Please. I’ll get those drinks.”

Moving with his usual clipped pace, Hux drew the aforementioned amber bottle out of the cabinets in his kitchenette, pulling down two short glasses as well. He filled the glasses, leaving them both on the counter as he slipped into the bedroom proper to change. Kylo turned to the side to give Hux a modicum of privacy, although he couldn’t prevent himself from glancing at the General surreptitiously as he picked up the nearest glass and sipped it. The brandy coated his throat in warm molten gold.

Hux’s pale frame appeared and disappeared, gone in an instant beneath regulation sleepwear — a soft black t shirt and long pants of the same material. He dropped the uniform into the laundry chute with a sneer. It hadn’t been visibly soiled, so Kylo assumed that Hux’s need to be rid of it had more to do with the memory it contained. Kylo wished he could obliterate every trace of Drayson from the galaxy. Everything the man had ever cared for. The lights flickered briefly.

Hux came back to retrieve his own glass. “Don’t go wrecking my quarters,” he said. There was minimal bite to the words.

Kylo drank in the sight of Hux’s pale arms and feet, and it left him feeling more intoxicated than any liquor ever had.  _ My co-commander, my general, mine _ , whispered the back of Kylo’s mind. “Sorry.” The mumbled apology drew Hux’s gaze to his face, curious. Kylo never apologized for destroying the ship.

“I was thinking about Drayson still.” Kylo said.

“He’s dead and done and we are here drinking a good vintage.” Hux said, leaning against the counter with a lightness to his frame that was not usually present. “In the morning we will be on Starkiller base overseeing the last of construction. The doom of the Republic will lay under our feet. Don’t let one short-sighted fool trouble you further.”

“He troubled you more than once,” Kylo said. “Didn’t he?”

Hux made a noncommittal noise. Then, “I told you to make yourself comfortable.” Kylo set his glass down and shed his robes and tunic, leaving them crumpled on the floor. He stood in his long black undershirt and leggings now. Hux nodded once in approval, grabbed the bottle, and made his way back to his bedroom. “Come,” he said. “I’m tired. Let’s sit.”

Kylo followed, taking a seat next to Hux on the General’s bed. They drank for a while in silence and Hux refilled their empty glasses.

“How many times?” Kylo asked when the silence became unbearable.

Hux sighed. “I don’t want to talk about it, Ren. It’s unpleasant. And it doesn’t change anything. Why do you want to know?”

Kylo didn’t have an answer he could voice, so ignored the question. “Why didn’t you tell me?” He asked instead. “I’d have stopped him.”

Hux snorted. “And why would you have done that?”

The words came out before Kylo had properly thought them, already at the surface. “You’re mine.” Hux turned to him, eyebrow raised, and Kylo added hastily, “My co-commander. Whatever was going on, he was hurting you. I wouldn’t have allowed it had I known.”

Their glasses were empty. Hux refilled them.

“I was planning his end myself,” Hux said at length. “But it had to look like natural causes, to avoid unnecessary questions.”

Kylo was intrigued. “How were you going to do that?”

“Poison,” Hux said simply. “The same kind I used on my father. Virtually undetectable in bloodwork and induces a heart attack. The problem was getting him to consume it. The bastard always refused any offer of food or drink on my ship. I was hoping to finally entice him with this,” Hux lifted the bottle. Kylo choked on the sip he was taking. Hux laughed, mouth splitting into a wide grin. The first unrestrained mirth Kylo had ever seen from him. “It’s clean, I promise. There’s a vial in my bedside drawer, unopened. That’s death in a bottle. This,” Hux sloshed the brandy. “This is victory.”

“You were going to offer Drayson a drink tonight,” Kylo mused.

“I’d hoped he would finally accept something stronger than blue milk. Otherwise I’d have to get creative. Hide a micro-needle medpatch on my tongue and finally give him that blowjob he wanted.” Hux considered, pursing his lips.

“Devious,” Kylo said. His heart did that clenching thing again. “Venomous.”

Hux preened. He held up his glass toward Kylo. “Cheers,” He said. Kylo clinked their glasses together. “Thank you for sparing me an unpleasant evening. You’re a better drinking companion, Ren. Ha! There’s something I never thought I’d say.”

The brandy was going to Kylo’s head. He felt sluggish and warm. “No one will ever hurt you again,” he told Hux, who seemed to find it amusing.

“You will,” Hux said mildly. Confidently, like it was fact. And why wouldn’t it be? They’d fought viciously before, screaming matches and even fisticuffs that ended with the General flying across the room to land hard on a control panel, his body vulnerable to the whims of Kylo’s anger. As it should be. As the galaxy should be. But Kylo was nothing if not a consistent disappointment to his masters. All it took to bring him low was copper hair fisted in a hand that wasn’t his, the sound of a laugh rough from disuse wrenched forward twice in one evening, the glow of white bare feet against black carpet in the starlight. That was all, and now he could no more crush Hux’s windpipe than destroy his grandfather’s helmet.

_ I’d never, I’ll never again _ , thought Kylo, but he didn’t say it. He knew Hux would only laugh. The mean sort of laugh, not the nice kind Kylo had drawn from him before. The kind that rang like a bell hung in Kylo’s heart. “Not in any way that matters.” He settled on. Hux raised an eyebrow but accepted it. “What did Drayson have on you?” Kylo asked.

“I was perfectly willing to degrade myself to keep my business mine in the interim. To kill him to preserve it forever.” Hux said.

“I could drag it out of you.”

“Already tossing threats again?”

“I’m sorry. I just want to help.”

Hux twitched, irritated. “Well don’t. It’s not like you.” He took the rest of his fourth glass like a shot and left the glass on the floor, laying back on his bed with a sigh. His shirt rode up, exposing an inch of white skin below his navel, dusted with fine red hair. Kylo wanted to bury his face there and inhale. “Thought you’d have delighted in my humiliation.” Hux murmured.

“I’d like to see you fall on your ass in front of your troopers,” Kylo said, and Hux snorted. Kylo finished his own drink and followed Hux’s example, laying back. Their shoulders brushed. “That was different, it wasn’t...humiliation. It was suffering. I couldn’t let him...let anyone do that to you.”

“Mmm,” Hux hummed. “Is that very Sith of you?”

“I’m not a Sith,” said Kylo. “Hate is the Dark Side. Anger.”

“Snoke is always berating you for having...attachments. I don’t intend to become another casualty of your wild emotions, Ren.” Hux’s eyes were so very pale looking at his. Silvery.

“You won’t.”

“Mm.”

“ Snoke wants me to cut away my attachments to the Light. Possession is the Dark Side. Passion is. Passion is the root of all Dark power.”

Hux chuckled deep in his throat. “Do you feel passion in my presence, Lord Ren?”

He was teasing, Kylo knew, but he met him without guile. “I do.”

Hux’s good humor waned. “I hate you,” He said softly. Kylo expected Hux to order him out of the room next, or at least to make some cutting remark. Instead Hux leaned his head down on Kylo’s shoulder.

They drifted, two bodies drenched in silver light, meeting at this one connection point. The heat of their skin mingled through the fabric of Kylo’s shirt. When Hux’s mind drifted into sleep, Kylo used the Force to gently adjust him so that he was oriented correctly in bed, and then sought the refuge of his own quarters.

Despite his assurances to Hux, Kylo felt the sickening stirrings of attachment in his chest. A faint link in the Force, a thread that he knew would lead him straight back to Hux’s bed, to the man’s own cold heart. It glimmered in the dark while Kylo tried to drift into the void, holding his form constant. It was black as pitch itself, but shining like crystal. Kylo’s pale skin reflected off it like a mirror, preventing full communion with the Dark. Snoke would see, would know. His mind whispered  _ mine _ , the Dark Side whispered to him,  _ lovely-dark-hatred-lust-yours _ . Would this too need to be severed, despite its inky sweetness? Meditation did nothing to calm the roiling in his mind that night.

It was 30 minutes till their shuttle planetside would leave, and Hux was already on the bridge giving instructions for his absence — to Phasma, wonderfully, instead of that prick Drayson — when he heard about the situation in his quarters. Hurrying back, he cursed his co-commander under his breath. At least he’d slept well before Ren’s fiery return to ruining his life. Ren was childish, an overgrown and tumultuous bully with the powers of a god. Who rarely used those powers to be helpful. Who was currently using them to trash the General’s suite.

Three terrified troopers waited outside his room, visors locked on the closed but shuddering door and the muted noises coming from within. Their blasters were trained on the door.

“At ease,” Hux told them. “Report to Captain Phasma. I will check in with her in ten minutes.”

“Yes, sir,” said a trooper. They almost seemed reluctant to turn away, but did so at double time when he raised an eyebrow at them. Three troopers wouldn’t deter Ren anyway. They’d only be killed. Hux alone was immune to murder, if not immune to bodily harm, in the Knight’s presence, thanks to their shared rank and Hux’s usefulness to Snoke. Hux stepped forward, his door opening at his signature and then closing behind him, sealing him into seething darkness.

Ren had destroyed most of the lights in the room, leaving it in smoking gloom. Several vicious saber marks glowed dull orange in the walls. His desk was halved, his closet torn open and uniforms strewn across the floor. The blue light of the fresher flickered through its doorway, like cold flashes of space lightning. He could hear the water running, a waste — Ren had likely taken an arcing swing across the small room. His bed was destroyed, a mass of burning foam and fabric.

None of this was extremely disheartening. An attack on any part of the Finalizer was an attack on Hux, and Ren attacked the Finalizer whenever his mood darkened. Ren probably thought that this space was more personal, but this time nothing related to his ship’s function was destroyed, which was preferable. What was surprising was Ren’s lack of robes and helmet.

Hux did not see Ren’s face often lit by the red glow of his saber, and was taken again by how young the Knight was. His wide brown eyes and soft mouth made him look younger than his years. Boyish. It was no wonder he wore the mask in the halls of the Finalizer. No one who saw him this way would fear him. Hux didn’t fear that face, even rendered in sharp contrast by the crackling lightsaber.

“Ren,” Hux said evenly, “Stop this tantrum at once.”

Ren’s face twisted in anger, expected. Those dark eyes overflowed with tears, unexpected. “You,” Ren snarled, voice low and shaking with emotion. He stalked forward, lightsaber dragging an angry red wound into the floor.

Hux felt weightless and cold, like he’d just been pushed out an airlock. He schooled his face into neutrality and held his ground, fixing Ren with an icy stare. “Put that unstable toy away, and we will discuss your grievances.”

Ren stood before him, breathing hard, tears streaming down his face. Tears. Pathetic, really. For a long beat they considered each other, Hux cool as a dead star and Ren a supernova. Ren sheathed his saber and hooked it on his belt. They were enveloped in smoky darkness, aside from the erratic blue flashing of the fresher light.

“Good,” Hux said. “Speak.”

Ren’s voice was ragged, ruined. Like something soft dragged along the sharp cliffs of Mustafar in the crackling heat of the lava flows. “You,” he began again, “you toy with me.”

Hux scoffed, “I do my job. I do it well. And I do little else. What do you mean?”

Ren nearly growled, taking two steps forward and grabbing Hux by the shoulders. His hands were huge, grip hard enough to bruise.

Hux could smell him. Sweat and smoke and the tang of his breath — he’d had caf this morning. The thought was ludicrous, Ren making himself a steaming mug of caf to start his day before going on a rampage. Did he take sweetener? Hux swallowed a manic giggle that would be his death if it escaped.

Their faces flickered like two pale ghosts, inches apart. Hux did not pretend to understand the depth of Ren’s periodic rages, but he felt that this one was significant in a way which the others weren’t. Standing together now, they were on the precipice of a long fall. One that would crack their skulls when they hit the bottom, if they tumbled over the edge. “Ren,” He said, voice quiet. Soft. Not pleading, of course not, but horribly close. “I’ve not the faintest idea what you’re going on about. Whatever’s gotten into your head is no fault of mine. We leave in fifteen for Starkiller. Release me.” Ren sucked in a breath as if struck, and his hands sprang open.

Hux turned on his heel and left Ren standing alone, the chill not leaving him even as his door whooshed open and shut behind him and he stood again in the bright lights of the Finalizer’s halls. His hands were shaking and he hid them in the pockets of his coat. He tried to feel as though he weren’t fleeing, and did not succeed.


	2. Toying With You

Starkiller’s construction was on schedule. Hux spent his days prowling his base, descending on terrified engineers with questions that made even their heads spin, sometimes rolling his sleeves up and doing their work himself as they cringed away from his cutting remarks on their capabilities.

He was in a foul mood. Had been, since arriving. Since leaving the Finalizer, really. Each step forward with the base wrenched at him nearly as much as every setback had in the months prior. He was balanced on the edge of a knife. No, the edge of a saber. That was the ugly truth of it. His staff and his troopers, trained to snap to attention at the sight of him, had begun to shrink away or outright flee from him as they did with Ren.

Ren, who had made himself scarce, fading into nothing more than another frozen shadow in the halls of the great humming machine. A wraith, tormenting Hux with his absence as much as his presence. The General felt tugged at, shadow fingers brushing the base of his neck, excitement and dread in his gut preventing sleep. When would he begin to tear in two?

Just when Hux was beginning to accept, with abject horror, that this avoidance may be the new stasis between them, Ren’s ID appeared at his door at 20:00 hours. Hux pressed the button at the side of his desk to allow Ren entry, setting his datapad aside and pulling a battered tin from one of his desk drawers.

“Lord Ren,” He quipped, rolling the R in the way he knew annoyed the man. “Pour us a couple drinks would you? Cabinet to your left.” Hux took his gloves off and opened the tin, shuffling the pack of cards within.

Ren set two glasses of whiskey down on his desk and took a seat heavily in the guest chair across from him. He unmasked himself and dropped the helmet gracelessly to the floor. His face was stormy, plush lips pressed together, eyes dark under low brows.

“What are you doing?” He grunted, watching Hux lay the cards out.

“Toying with you,” Hux said, face neutral but eyes laughing.

“I don’t know any card games,” Ren protested.

“This one is simple,” Hux told him. “And I’ll teach you. Hang that ridiculous robe up, there’s no reason for it at my desk. Gloves too. And get my cigarette tin from my side table while you’re up. The lighter’s there too.”

Ren got up with an annoyed huff to do his bidding. Hux was pleased when Ren did hang his robe by the door instead of discarding it on the floor. Ren disappeared into Hux’s bedroom — separated here on base in a sprawling suite with a divider — and returned with the cigarettes, opening the case for Hux to select one.

“A. Hux?” He asked, and Hux’s nose scrunched in disgust.

“A gift from my father.”

“The name?”

“The case. You forgot my lighter.”

“You don't need it. Lean in,” Ren said, lifting his bare left hand and snapping his fingers. A tiny flame appeared just above where his thumb and forefinger touched, looking like the disembodied wick of a candle.

Hux leaned toward, touching the tip of his cigarette to the flame and inhaling until it was lit. “Quite the party trick,” he murmured around his first drag, savoring the acrid smoke in his lungs before releasing it out his nose. Ren shook his hand, the flame guttering out.

“Pyrokinesis,” Ren said, “I can generate fire by manipulating air molecules against each other until they heat up. The Sith Lords of old were also known to manipulate fires they’d set while in battle.”

“So Fire generation is solidly on the dark side then? I’ll have you light my cigarettes more often. Consider it training,” Hux chuckled, dividing his card deck and placing a half in front of each of them.

Ren seemed to consider that more deeply than Hux intended, eventually saying, “Manipulation, yes, that’s Sith. Generation...I don’t know. My mother taught me that, actually. To light candles.”

Hux felt his eyebrows raise at that. “Were you raised by candlelight?” He asked, incredulous.

“No,” Ren said, “I mean... in my Jedi training, yes. But my mother just liked them. She had perfumed ones around the house. You weren’t, then? Raised by candlelight?”

“No,” Hux said, taking another long drag and exhale of tobacco. “We had algae lamps. Horrid blue light, hardly cut through the rain and gloom. The electric lights of a star destroyer were one of the finest sights I’d seen as a cadet.” He drew from his card pile and held the card up, it's back to Ren. “Here, these are the rules. We each draw and the one with a higher card takes both. If we draw and it’s a tie, we draw until the tie is broken and the winner takes all cards drawn that round. Whichever of us takes all the other’s cards first wins the game. Got it?”

“Yes,” Ren said. And then, “Should we wager?”

“What do you have that I would want?” Hux eyed him.

“If you win, I won’t destroy anything on your ship or base for a month.”

Hux snorted, “If I win, you won’t destroy anything on my ship or base ever again.”

Ren smiled, “That’s a steep wager. What do I get if I win?” He drew his first card and held it up tantalizingly, eyes boring into Hux.

“If you win,” Hux said, “I won’t try to kill you...for a month.”

“Tempting, but...if I win,” Ren said, “I get to name my prize.”

“Absolutely not,” Hux snapped.

“Do you want to play or not?” Ren asked him.

“You are here as my guest,” Hux reminded him, but set down his card face up.

Ren followed suit, groaning at the result. Hux laughed, taking both cards. They went again, and played in tense silence for a few rounds, before Ren broke it.

“Your base nears completion.”

“Yes. She is a weapon rivaled by none in history.” Hux said, though his voice lacked the satisfaction it should have.

“You grow more worried as you near the end,” Ren said, “I feel it even from the kyber caves across the base. I’d have thought you’d be happy.”

Hux made a noncommittal sound. So that was where Ren had been hiding away. “I got your calendar update,” he said instead of answering. “You’re going off base in a week?”

“Yes,” Ren said, “Orders from Snoke. He has located the map to Skywalker. I’m to retrieve it before it falls into rebel hands.”

“I don’t understand what all the fuss about an old Jedi is,” Hux said, wincing as Kylo won another round. “The heroes of old are...well, they’re old. And they’re hiding. They’re no match for the might of the Order and they are well aware of that.”

“I must finish what my grandfather started,” Ren said gravely. “I will finish the Jedi. I will end Luke Skywalker, as he tried to end me.”

“You’ve fought him?” Hux asked, curiosity piqued.

Ren’s face screwed up in indecision before he sighed and said, “Skywalker was my teacher. My old master, before Snoke. But he lied to me. Betrayed me. Tried to prevent me from becoming more powerful than him...attacked me while I slept. I failed to strike him down before. I will not fail again.”

Hux smoked silently, absorbing that. He decided not to comment on it. Eventually he said, “My teacher at the academy didn’t survive me.”

Ren’s eyes brightened, “Oh? Did he try to kill you?”

Hux laughed. “He tried to embarrass me. Old Commandant Hux’s son...he’d always had it out for me, and by my senior year he wanted blood. He called on me in class frequently and was dissatisfied with my answers. Thought I was uppity. So he had a couple of teacher’s aides haul me up to the front one day and strip my shirt off. Said he was going to cane my skinny back until I’d learned proper respect for authority. He landed a couple of strikes on me. I still have the scars. I broke free and took the cane from him. Lashed his face. Broke his jaw. If I’d stopped there I might have only been punished worse. But I snapped the cane and shoved the sharp end of the handle down his throat. Watched him spit blood around it till he died. The higher ups...they liked that. Combined with my good marks at the academy, I could have whatever posting I wanted after graduation.” Hux paused to take a sip of whiskey.

“It wasn’t a betrayal for you,” Ren said thoughtfully, “You never trusted him.”

“No,” Hux murmured, “Betrayal does not exist without trust.”

“Have you never trusted?” Ren pressed.

“Myself,” Hux smirked, feline. He blew smoke pointedly across his desk at Ren. “Sloane, when I was very young. It passed quickly.”

“Sloane?”

“Grand Admiral Sloane. She rescued me from Arkanis when it was under rebel siege, but also from my father. For a time. He refrained from beating me under her watch. That was enough to win a child’s love. Of course, eventually our paths parted. I learned that I can rely on no one but myself.”

Kylo seemed troubled at that. “That’s lonely,” he said at length.

Hux eyed him, “You aren’t?”

Kylo didn’t answer, laying another card down instead. They played more rounds in silence, Hux’s shoulders tensing as Ren won more and more of his deck.

“What posting did you choose?” Ren asked. “Since you could take any you wanted. The Finalizer?”

“No,” Hux said, “Though she’s only been commanded by me. I took up a position as a sniper in planetside conflicts. Both because I loved it and because my father would’ve rolled in his grave.”

“He was dead by then?”

“By then. Yes.”

“A sniper. You loved it?”

“I did.”

“Why?” Ren’s face was rapt.

“I was good at it,” Hux said first, then grew thoughtful. “It was...direct. So little warfare is now. I saw my enemies die. I kept my unit safe. Myself. With my hands, with my rifle and scope. And I was very, very good at it.”

“You’re good at this, too.” Ren said.

“Cards?” Hux asked, teasing.

“Cards,” Ren laughed, “and commanding.”

“You as well,” Hux said. “Cards, if not commanding.”

“Ass,” Ren spat at him, smiling. Hux discarded his first cigarette and leaned forward for Ren to light him another. “Give me a drag,” Ren demanded once he had. They passed the cigarette back and forth, each of them running out of cards, though Hux’s were dwindling faster. It rankled him though this was only a game of chance. Their near-silence was comfortable. It didn’t ease all of Hux’s turmoil, but it took the edge off. It certainly took the edge off. To think that they might have had years like this. But perhaps not. Perhaps this could only have been achieved through Ren’s killing of that putrid admiral on Hux’s behalf, the creation of an ever-evolving game of favors between them.

Ren’s voice drew Hux out of his reverie, “Not right now.”

“What?”

“I’m not lonely right now.” Ren said, dark eyes too big, too shiny, full mouth too pouty. Boyish. Heartbreaking. They turned their cards up. Tie. Next round. Ren. He smiled wide, flashing his crooked teeth as he claimed Hux’s final cards.

“Congratulations,” Hux said icily. “Name your prize then. You’ve won. I haven’t the faintest idea why I wagered against a force-user.”

“I didn’t cheat,” Kylo said, “And I want...you to teach me something else. Teach me to shoot.”

Hux was stunned.

“You’re good at it,” Ren needled him. “And you love it. I could ask for worse. Teach me. You have your rifle here?”

“I do.”

“Tomorrow, then.”

Hux leaned back in his chair, studying Ren. He felt Ren doing the same to him with more than his eyes. Phantom fingers grazing the back of his neck. “All right. Tomorrow.”


	3. Calm Before The Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are approaching the events of TFA which will be played with. TW for suicidal ideation + spacedrug use, and Ren and Hux being Impure Of Heart, Dumb Of Ass narcissistic morons who have more feelings about each other's feelings than about murder or galactic war crimes.

The surface of Starkiller Base was rendered in black and white, made up of little more than frost, sparse arboreal forest, and the craggy entrances to crystal caves. The cold was brisk but tolerable as Hux stepped out of the shuttle, Ren close behind. He’d made the Knight go back to his quarters and add another layer of clothing before they set off this morning. Not that Ren would have complained. He’d likely have suffered in silence, but shivering would have entirely spoiled the lesson.

Hux led Ren to the spot he’d picked after accompanying a unit of troopers on their morning rounds. It was a rocky outcropping with plenty of cover, shaded by the tall black-trunked trees native to this planet. A frozen waterfall jutted down from between boulders to a wide, icy river below. The trooper units went by in pairs every quarter hour on the opposite bank across the river, approximately 60 yards by Hux’s estimate. Hux made quick work of setting up his rifle near the cliff’s edge, getting down flat on his stomach to peer through the scope and adjust his aim.

“Come on, then,” he said to Ren. “Get down here.” Ren haltingly joined him on the frozen ground. Hux rattled off a list of the rifle’s parts, touching the white and black plastisteel accordingly to point them out to Ren. “Muzzle, bipod, front sight, scope, magazine. I’ve got stun bolts for this exercise. Trigger, I disabled the fingerprint scan temporarily. This is the rear grip. Look at how I’m holding the blaster. The recoil is strong so you don’t want it right on your collar bone. Put your cheek on the stock to look through the scope. Any questions?”

“You learned to shoot at the Academy?”

“Any relevant questions?”

“Hux.”

“I learned to shoot a rifle at the Academy, yes, though it wasn’t standard curriculum.”

“You were special, then. Top of your class?” Ren asked. He had that same rapt look on his face from the card game, and Hux propped himself up on an elbow, deciding to let this spool out into whatever it would.

“I had high marks in my courses. That’s not what got me private lessons. I was in the Commandant’s Cadets.”

“Your father selected you?”

“No.” Hux felt himself smile drily at that.

“You’d killed him by then.”

“Yes. It was run in secret by its senior members after my father’s demise and I joined entirely by accident.”

“What got you in?”

“Same thing as everyone else. I killed another cadet and didn’t get caught. Made it look like an accident, to everyone who didn’t know what to look for.” Hux paused, waiting to be asked.

Ren didn’t make him wait long. “Tell me.”

“The Academy was built around an old fortress on the cliffs overlooking the Gunmetal Sea. Three buildings with a yard between, facing the cliff edge and an old temple spire called Area Null. The spire and the cliffs - anything further than the edge of the yard - were off limits to cadets. It rains on Arkanis, heavy downpours thrice a week and constant drizzle otherwise. There were steps cut into the cliffside leading down to the shore, as old as Area Null, perhaps older. They were uneven and worn. Always slick. Treacherous. A boy who’d gotten me a demerit for sneaking out of bed met his end on them. It fooled the teachers and officers but not my fellow cadets. He wasn’t the type to have gone where he shouldn’t. His fault was in trying to hold me to the rules along with himself.”

“So they approached you after that, and you joined?”

“There was a ceremony in Area Null. We drank nerf blood out of a stone cup, wore our regulation blankets as cloaks. You’d have liked it,” Hux wrinkled his nose.

“The Knights don’t drink nerf blood,” Ren rolled his eyes, breaking the look they’d been sharing. “Why’d you join if you didn’t like it?”

“I dislike theatrics. I like power. I found the perks worth staying,” Hux turned back onto his stomach and resumed his prone position. “Now. Any _relevant_ questions?” He felt the light brush of Ren’s mind against his, and allowed it.

“Got a target in mind?” Ren asked.

“I gave notice to the Captain to ignore distress signals from these coordinates. Training for you, and training for the stormtroopers on patrol. As I said, stun bolts. They’ll be fine.”

“And if they shoot back?”

“Ensure they don’t hit us. I’ve seen you stop plasma bolts in midair before. If you stun them correctly in the first place they won’t shoot back. Here comes the 17:00 hours pair. Right, watch me closely, Ren. You’re up next.” Hux leaned his cheek into the stock and sighted his troopers’ white helmets through the scope, taking in a slow, cold breath.

He sank into the memory of the correct stance as one might sink into bed after a long day, muscles relaxing. Time slowed. Hux squeezed the trigger just as he started to breathe out, cycling his breath in a count of eight. The orange stun bolt found its mark, dropping the trooper furthest from them with a clean headshot. If he’d chosen the closer trooper, their partner would have swung around to aim counterfire across the river on instinct. Because he’d shot the further one, their partner brought their gun up toward the forest on that side, offering up the back of their helmet. Hux breathed in, squeezed the trigger a second time, breathed out. The remaining trooper dropped to the forest floor where they’d stood.

“Now,” Hux said, “The next two will be on high alert, so prepare yourself. Take a practice shot at that boulder, the one without snow on it.” He shifted over so Ren could take his place, adjusting the Knight’s grip on his rifle physically until he was satisfied with it.

Ren looked through the scope, aiming, and shot. It went wide of the boulder, striking a distant tree instead with a crack. Ren frowned.

“No one makes their first shot,” Hux told him. “Again.” Ren fired two more before striking the boulder, leaving a black mark on it. “The next trooper pair is approaching,” Hux told him. Ren shifted slightly, trying to relax himself in this unfamiliar position. It was funny to watch, and Hux suppressed a smile.

The troopers approached, noticed their fallen comrades, and drew their weapons, swivelling around as they stalked forward. Ren breathed in. His first shot caught the near trooper in the torso, knocking them flat. Their partner swiveled, aimed. Ren shot first, catching their shoulder.

“Yes! Good,” Hux said automatically, propping himself up to squint at where four troopers lay stunned across from them. “Clean. Very nice, Ren.” When he turned to look at Ren, he found the man staring at him incredulously. Hux made a face right back at him. “What?”

Ren jumped as if startled. “Nothing. I just...nothing. Here, your turn.” He scooted over. Hux took his place and began the process of adjusting his posture and grip in preparation for the next pair. Ren spoke up again. “You’re sure it was good? I missed a lot, with the boulder.”

Hux stilled, doing a quick recap in his mind of his interactions with Ren over the years, and of the meetings he’d attended with Snoke. Was Ren never praised? Hux thought it possible. And a shame. There was no greater waste than the failure to properly cultivate a promising student. “Three missed shots does not qualify as ‘a lot’, Ren,” he said. “And you hit your live targets. You’re a quick study.” Ren went red immediately. Hux silently resolved to give the Knight more praise where it was due.

They each stunned another pair of troopers before Hux called an end to the exercise, sending a comm to the unit captain with the coordinates of the troopers needing pickup. The shuttle ride back seemed to pass more quickly. The cold and the feeling of a plasma bolt under his trigger finger had refreshed Hux in a way few things could. Even Ren was noticeably lighter through his frame. Though he’d put his helmet back on when they re-entered the shuttle, his presence no longer kept the two troopers piloting the craft from talking quietly among themselves. Hux followed their example and turned to his own companion. “It’s nearly 19:00. I’ll take dinner in my quarters. You could join me, if you like.”

“So long as you don’t serve nerf blood.” Ren intoned through his vocoder. The troopers’ conversation lulled and then started up again a bit louder in compensation.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Ren,” Hux said. “There isn’t a nerf on this whole bloody planet.”

The week had passed quickly, as though they walked through a dream. Kylo silently rejoined the officers’ meetings, listening to Hux detail the progress of the Order’s superweapon to his senior staff. They shot Hux’s rifle in their off hours. Kylo joined the General for dinner every night, and a cigarette and card game after. Two nights he stayed late for a drink. Hux didn’t change out of his uniform again, but he routinely removed his gloves and boots in his quarters, and Kylo relished the intimacy of that. He found excuses to hand Hux things - glasses, cards. Once he’d used the Force to steal Hux’s secondary datapad (who in the galaxy needs two of them?) away as he reached for it and then handed it back to him physically. Hux had squawked about that and tended to keep the machine in his desk afterward. Kylo made a habit of using his free hand to guide Hux’s while he lit his cigarettes for him.

And he catalogued what he saw, saving the images away in his mind like heirloom holophotos. Snapshots of the way the tendons in the back of Hux’s hands moved when he typed at his datapad or shuffled cards. The funny way he lifted his cigarettes to his mouth, holding them between his first two fingers instead of with a thumb, tilting his head up and to the right slightly to take a drag. The sight of Hux pacing his quarters in sock feet, waving his hands animatedly while he talked about work, calling up schematics and magnifying them to show Kylo exactly what he meant.

Kylo stowed all of these moments away like treasures, and the black glimmering tether running between their presences in the Force solidified. He hadn’t been able to meditate successfully all week, a fact that nagged at him. His mission off-base would begin in the morning, and after it was completed he would speak to Snoke, and Snoke would see. Despite himself Kylo hoped that would not be the end of this new and pleasant thing between himself and Hux. _Weak_ , he’d hissed to himself in his room. He’d destroyed it twice over this week and then lived in the wreckage rather than request repairs. Still he hoped that tonight was not the end. If it was, it should be commemorated.

“Brought you something,” he said as he entered Hux’s quarters.

“Oh? Should I be nervous?” Hux looked up from his primary datapad, closing it and putting both in his desk drawer.

“Very. Come here and close your eyes.”

“If it’s something disgusting I’ll have you punished,” Hux said, coming to stand in front of Kylo even as he griped.

“Would you do it yourself? I might have to rethink this.”

“Don’t be vulgar.” Hux closed his eyes, making a show of steeling himself against what was to come.

Kylo set a jar into Hux’s palms, cautioning, “Heavy. Okay, now open.”

“Ah,” Hux said. “You _do_ want to be punished. How did you order namana nectar? The Bakurans jealously guard their supply.”

“One of my knights sent it to me. Have you had it?” Kylo asked, feeling giddy as Hux glared at him.

“The Empire used it as a symbol of cowardice after Bakura signed their truce with Leia Organa over a nectar toast,” Hux said, holding the jar up to the light to observe its color.

“I’ve had it,” Kylo told him. “And it’s not for cowards.”

“I have to be up in the morning,” Hux said dismissively, but didn’t set the jar aside. “So we’re sharing a serving.”

“Alright. Meet you on the couch,” Kylo said, ducking into the kitchenette to get a spoon. He nearly dove onto the couch, bouncing slightly. “Come on, open it.” Hux made the distasteful face that meant both _childish, Ren_ and _okay, Ren_. He unscrewed the nondescript black lid of the jar and lifted it, strings of the viscous nectar lifting away with it. It was rich amber in color. A deep floral scent pervaded the room. “Have you seen a namana tree?”

“I haven’t.”

“They’re huge,” Ren sat up and spread his arms to drive the point home, “Gold bark, and they grow these flowers that come down like curtains.”

“Lovely, I’m sure. Do we ingest this straight?”

“It’s better that way. You need to taste it,” Kylo leaned in with the spoon and scooped up a generous helping. “Take half of this. Here,” He brought the spoon up toward Hux.

“I can do that myself,” Hux took the spoon and gingerly sucked part of the nectar from it, licking his lips after. The flash of his tongue made Kylo’s skin prickle. He handed the spoon back and Kylo put the whole thing in his mouth, trying in vain to distinguish any trace of Hux. The taste of the nectar overpowered all of his senses, as he knew it would. It hit his tongue like the strongest alcohol and burned all the way down. His eyes watered and his vision seemed to swim subtly, and he felt like he might never smell anything else. Blood roared in his ears, dampening everything else as if he was sitting underwater. The aftertaste was sweet like a jungle fruit. Hux was experiencing the same things, his skin flushed and his pupils blown wide within the tiniest slivers of green. “That was rather immediate,” he said, and coughed.

“It stimulates dopamine release in the human brain,” Kylo said, repeating the explanation that had been given to him in his past life. “Lights up the pleasure center. It also has psychoactive effects.”

Hux cut him off, standing abruptly and holding both his hands out to the light then rubbing them together. “Kriff!” he swore. “That feels different.” He began to pace the room, acting in the same manic way he tended to after two drinks. Kylo, for his part, was content to meld with the couch and watch the walls swim and the rainbows cascade down from the room’s lights. The gray durasteel walls moved, suddenly full of so many shades it was hard to remember they were gray. Had the shadows always been so blue and purple, the light always so green?

Hux’s voice broke into Kylo’s consciousness. “I’m hot. Are you hot? Is it hot?” Before Kylo could answer, Hux sat down next to him again, formal rigidity gone out of his posture and the barest hint of some crass accent leaching into his voice. “You’re not listening to me. I said it's hot. I’m taking my jacket off.” Hux unzipped himself and pulled his uniform down on his shoulders before getting stuck and actually _whining_.

The sound shocked a laugh out of Kylo, and Hux was even too far gone to shoot him a murderous glare for it. “Here,” Kylo gasped out, still laughing, “here, hold on.” He pulled Hux’s jacket off, hyper aware of how the man shuddered when Kylo’s fingers grazed his bare arms. “There. Better?” Kylo murmured, watching Hux’s skin pebble up.

“Yes. It’s hot, Ren. Take yours off,” Hux said, rubbing his hands up and down his arms once, pausing, and then repeating that rhythm as he stared ahead. “The wall is moving.” He added.

“Mmhm,” Kylo agreed, slowly divesting himself of his tunic so that they both sat in their regulation undershirts. They sat in silence until the room’s lights dulled automatically, following a day-night schedule. Kylo communed with the couch. Hux leaned in to his side. Just as the lights in the room hit ten percent, the creeping colors started to fade from Kylo’s vision. The high didn’t last quite as long for force users, he remembered Luke claiming. It seemed to hold true. Hux’s eyes were still dark and glazed. “Still good?” He asked, running his tongue around his mouth to chase away the sour-sweet residue of the nectar.

“Cold. When did it get cold?” Hux asked.

“Come here,” Kylo said, pulling Hux closer and putting an arm around him. Hux sighed and snuggled into him like a lothcat into a sunning rock, and Kylo shakily crossed his legs to hide any reaction stirring there. “The last time I took namana nectar,” Kylo told Hux, “I felt like I was being torn apart. It feels good, yes. But I was told that it would help me commune with the Light, dampen my feelings. I think it makes everything more intense. It made me think that I was...failing, I guess. My body was failing another task. I felt like that often. I was always...doing things wrong. I was too much. I still feel that way sometimes. Still..torn in two. But it’s been...better. Better. The Dark welcomes emotion.”

“Torn apart,” Hux murmured. “I know the feeling.”

Kylo shifted to look at him. “You do?”

Hux chuckled, and this time it was a cold, awful sound. There was no mirth in it, no life in his eyes. “The different things that I want,” He started, voice going breathy. “I can’t have them all. Every step toward one takes me further from the other. Torn in two. I can’t see...I can’t see the end of either path.” His voice broke on the last word, and Kylo’s stomach jumped. “You know, I’ve thought… I’ve thought _often_ of ending it myself.”

“Ending what?” Kylo heard himself ask.

“Me,” Hux said. “After Starkiller. If it -- when it fires. I’ve thought of killing myself. After.”

Kylo went cold with horror. He sat up, nearly pulling Hux into his lap, brushing away the tears he found trailing down Hux’s face and holding his jaw in his hands. He pulled Hux to him and kissed his forehead, his cheek. Kylo’s throat was dry when he spoke. “Do you have a plan?”

“Who do you think I am?”

“What is it? Hux,” He said sharply, caressing Hux’s face. “What is your plan?”

“The poison. I’d take it. Waste not.”

Kylo breathed in through his nose and struggled to breathe back out slowly. “Give me the vial.”

Hux was derisive, scorning, “Ren, I carry a blaster at all times.”

“But that’s not your plan. You have it with you, don’t you? Give me the vial. Please.”

Hux stared at him, pupils finally shrinking, taken aback but coming around slowly, making that face again that was _childish, Ren_ and _okay, Ren_. He slowly disentangled himself, Kylo’s hands not falling from his face until he slipped out of reach, and disappeared behind the divider to his dark bedroom.

Kylo waited a moment, and then got up to follow, heart hammering. He entered Hux’s room just as Hux was pulling the dark bottle from his nightstand. Hux sat on his bed, looking at the vial in his hands. Kylo walked over to him in halting steps.

“Take it, then, you beast,” Hux held the bottle out once Kylo was within reach. Hux laughed again, and it ended in a sob. “I’m doomed anyway. Oh, if only you knew.”

“I’m putting this in my quarters,” Kylo held up the bottle.

“In your tunic,” Hux corrected. “And then come back, and stay.”

Kylo did. He’d never shared a bed with someone before, and lay awake after Hux sank into sleep, listening to him breathe. They were apart except for Hux’s hand hot on Kylo’s arm. _As if I’d leave, as if he’s checking_ . Tears had sprung up in Kylo’s eyes after Hux’s were closed, and they rolled back silently into his hair now. Tomorrow he would continue his mission to find and destroy Skywalker, as the wretched Jedi had tried to destroy him. Kylo Ren would become as powerful as Darth Vader. It was his destiny, and his attachments... _this_ attachment weakened him. Distracted him. _I must be strong enough to sever these ties_ , he thought, and did not shake his arm from Hux’s grip.

When at last he slept it was fitfully in the clutches of a dream. He walked a flagstone path behind Hux toward the edge of a cliff in the pouring rain. Lightning illuminated the silhouette of an old tower. There were bodies heaped in piles beside the path in the tall grass, skin pale green in the muted light, open eyes filled with rainwater. Children in little robes, a pimple-faced boy in a cadet uniform, the twisted and charred forms of rebels cut down in battle, Admiral Drayson. And more, enough corpses to fill a star system. Kylo wrenched his gaze away from the dead and back to Hux. He wasn’t wearing his uniform, Kylo realized with a start. He was in plainclothes, something Han might’ve worn when Ben was small. Kylo started to call out, to ask Hux if they could go back, when Hux took off in a dead sprint. Kylo sprinted after him, boots scrabbling over the wet flagstones, the cliff approaching. He reached out, grabbing for the vest Hux wore, but his hand closed around empty air. Hux threw himself from the cliffside. Kylo’s shout was buried in rain and thunder. When Kylo woke in Hux’s bed he did it alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gonna plug my Kylux playlist in case anyone needs some tunes, yeehaw: [Kylux Spotify Playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6YRMYaT5fte0cPWH5UVGW5?si=J3LTK6tkRyqlKb_taM7eHg)


	4. Jakku

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The force awakens! Unknown to Kylo who hasn't noticed any suspicious scavengers yet. This is a short one I'm just going ahead and posting it because I think what comes next fits better as a separate chapter.

The miasma of battle still hung around Kylo when the flickering hologram of Snoke appeared before him. He relayed the results of his mission in a wooden voice. The rebel camp was destroyed despite having been apparently tipped off to his arrival. Resistance pilot Poe Dameron had been captured and then lost along with a defecting stormtrooper. The map to Skywalker was lost alongside them in the memory banks of a BB droid. Kylo felt just as burnt on the inside as his cloak was. Stiff, cracked. Fragile.

“I’ve failed.”

“You will not fail again,” Snoke said, his raspy voice conveying both comfort and warning as it always did. “You will obtain this droid. You will find and eliminate the traitor in the ranks of the Order. You will face Skywalker. You will overcome your weaknesses.”

“Yes, Master.” Kylo braced himself for the next blow. Silence stretched on. Snoke’s cratered face twisted in impatience. “Master,” Kylo said. “My weaknesses-”

“Needn’t be revisited at this time. Do not delay in recovering this droid. General Hux will assist you. You are dismissed.” The hologram fizzled out, leaving him alone.

Kylo stood for a moment, stunned, before exiting the comms chamber of the Light Cruiser for the main bay where the troops sat. He barked at one, “Direct the pilot to set our course for Starkiller,” and took their seat for himself. Once the craft lurched into hyperspace, Kylo dug his own seldom-used datapad out of his tunic and punched in a message to Hux.

_Ren, K: Mission status red, imminent return to base._

He paused, gloved fingers twitching over the pad, and then added to it.

_Ren, K: I need to speak with you._

_Ren, K: At once._

With Phasma and the troopers preoccupied licking their wounds, Ren allowed himself to rest the back of his helmet against the wall. Was it possible that he’d misconstrued his attachment to Hux as a weakness? But no, it was disrupting his meditation. Preventing full communion with the Dark Side. Was it possible that Snoke hadn’t seen it? That he was yet unaware? The thought hit like a plasma bolt, stunned like one. It sank deep into his brain like a drop of Xenoboric acid sinks into flesh. It fizzled there and refused to budge, corroding a hole in Snoke’s image. If Snoke didn’t know…didn’t see.... His datapad chimed.

_Hux, A: I will meet you in the docking bay._

_…_

_Hux, A: You neglected to inform me of your own status._

_Ren, K: Stable._

_Ren, K: Unharmed._

Hux inquiring about his ‘status’ hit him in an entirely different way. Kylo could picture the pinched expression on Hux’s face as the man searched for the way to phrase his concern as contempt. He could practically taste the irritation Hux must have felt as he typed that message, frustration at Kylo for not volunteering the information and at himself for asking at all. They were both thawing out, though, weren’t they? Kylo had barely resisted the urge to ask after Hux’s wellbeing in return, though he knew the General hadn’t left base.

Kylo queued up the visitor records of Hux’s quarters on Starkiller just to see _Ren, K_ lined up next to each hour the night before he’d left, a neat solid row indicating he’d stayed overnight. His name and Hux’s at the end of a string of _Hux, A_ nights.

And then a Hux and Phasma night. He scrolled up, watching as Phasma’s name appeared again. With regularity. The screen cracked. A harsh intake of breath through his vocoder had several troopers looking at him in alarm. Captain Phasma called across the shuttle to him, informal as she was wont to be after a fight, “If you’ve got injuries you need to tend them.”

“No need,” Kylo’s voice crackled through the vocoder. He was grateful for it when his throat constricted like this. The simple fragility of a light ship of this type stilled his hand as it twitched toward his saber. _Weak. I’m so weak._

Hux eyed the message. Unharmed. He ran his hands through his hair, disheveling it spectacularly. _Thank the stars…_ The thought lingered unwanted, the weight of his anxiety over Ren’s life replaced with the equal weight of what that anxiety meant. It was uncomfortably parallel to the feelings he’d had for Sloane, for another boy in the Academy, for the other sniper in his unit in his first planetside assignment. Attractions had been fleeting and unacted on since then. Friends held at arm's length. Feelings lead to honesty. In this line of work honesty gets you ejected out an airlock. He was too close.

“Too close by half, Hux.” His voice sounded tinny in the solitude of his room. Small. It was frightening to hear himself small, worse than if he hadn’t broken his silence. He groped at the top right corner of his desk without looking, retrieved his cigarette tin and brought one to his lips before realizing his lighter was still in his bedroom, where it had been this last week. He tossed the case at the wall and it clattered to the floor. What little distance Ren’s mission had provided hadn’t allowed Hux to catch his breath. He was acting like...well, he was acting a bit like Ren. At this rate he doubted there was any escape from what they’d both set in motion. From the beginning had he ever been a safe distance from Ren? No, of course not. There was nothing safe about that man.

And there was nothing to do except what Hux had always done: take the next wrenching, heaving step in two directions at once. He tossed the unlit cigarette away as well, though it didn’t make a satisfying sound like the tin had, and drew his secondary datapad out of his desk drawer and plugged a chip into it. The room was illuminated with the twirling map of Starkiller base. He touched a few components, highlighting them, and paused. Fuel cells, thermal oscillator, entrance, exit. They flashed at him, awaiting annotation as if the full layout weren’t enough. He grimaced, touched them again in reverse order. Unhighlighted.

“Right then,” talking to himself again, when should he check himself in to the medical wing? “I can’t _reasonably_ do everyone’s job for them even when it would increase efficiency. I do my work and they do theirs. They’ve got to earn their keep.” He left the map without mark or annotation, tapped out a succinct comm -- only a future date -- and sent the comm before he could rethink it again. He shut the datapad away, and suited up in full uniform with his coat to walk the halls. There was time for a detour to the engineers lab and then he’d go to the docking bay to meet Ren. The flutter that thought caused in his chest was very worrying.

By the time the ship was docked and its crew disembarked, Kylo was livid. His skin itched with energy he was eager to use. Perhaps on the nearest control panel. Or on Mitaka. Even the sight of Hux standing ready for debrief instead of letting him wait, arms clasped behind his back and face unabashedly relieved to see Kylo whole, did little to lighten Kylo’s mood. He stalked forward heavily, stopping too close to Hux as was his custom when he was irritated. The General never gave him an inch, and was less perturbed now than usual, looking up their scant height difference without so much as a blink.

“Mission status red, then?”

Kylo kept his mask on, snarling through it. “The map to Skywalker was lost. We are to retrieve it.”

“Yes, I’ve received our orders as well. Snoke was explicit. Capture the droid if we can, destroy it if we must. I’ve got a trooper unit in mind--”

“Your men have already shown they couldn’t recover a _fucking ball droid_. Though they’re obviously skilled at committing high treason. One of them helped it, a trooper I took with me to the village. And someone tipped off the rebels. We’ve got a spy in the higher ranks.”

“My men are exceptionally trained, programmed from birth,” Hux hissed. “Careful, Ren, that you do not let your personal interests eclipse direct orders from our Supreme Leader.”

“I want that map. See that you get it.” Kylo glared daggers at Hux through his visor, wishing abruptly that he’d never slept beside him, cradled his face in his palms, begged him not to end his own life. Kylo had never been able to read Hux’s mind, a blockade he’d always attributed to Snoke, but years of practice had attuned him to the man’s moods. There wasn’t even a prickle of intimidation off him now, and Kylo was unused to getting what he wanted through other means. He made an effort to relax his shoulders and added, “I know you’ll get it. I have utmost faith in you, General.”

Hux didn’t relax in turn, snapping, “Don’t insult me with flattery. Pretending to like me won’t help your cause.” He turned and walked briskly down the hall toward the officers’ quarters.

Kylo followed, unable to keep his voice from leaning into petulance and grateful for the vocoder’s distortion. “I do like you.”

“You don’t.”

“Hux, really. Don’t be absurd.”

Hux shook his head, turned the argument around. “ _I_ don’t like _you_. You’re a blunt instrument, Ren, a mindless dog on the field of battle. And your singular obsession is putting my plans behind schedule with these wild hunts.” They arrived at Hux’s door and it slid open. Hux entered, and Kylo followed on his heels again, wrenching his helmet off so that Hux would meet his gaze directly.

“I didn’t say you’re perfect,” Kylo said after the door sealed them in.

“Ha! Lay my faults bare, then.”

“You steal time from the Order to pursue fruitless and selfish endeavors.” Kylo said, the finality and confidence of his statement wrenching a derisive snort from Hux.

“Me? I pursue fruitless endeavors? Like you with your magic artifacts and your stars-forsaken map? I steal time — like you and your tantrums and your meditation?” Hux’s cool demeanor cracked. He was furious at the insinuation that he wasted time. He, Hux, who famously avoided sleep and meals to work, who showed up to every obligation early, who knew every part of his ship inside out and could personally do the work of any officer or engineer on his ship. “How, exactly, does that apply to me and not you?”

“You regularly go out shooting during working hours, and you host your precious Captain Phasma overnight nearly once a week,” Ren spat, mood souring.

Hux was taken aback. “You read my visitor records? Why?”

Kylo seethed, “This is how the great General spends his time away from the bridge as his base is finished. Using his troopers for target practice and his officers for physical release.”

Hux said loftily, “You asked me to shoot with you. Shooting drills are regulation-approved use of working hours for an officer of my status. And on principle, I hardly see how what I do in my bedchamber during my rest hours is any business of yours, Ren.”

Kylo grimaced, teeth bared.

Hux turned and surveyed his desk, sighing heavily as he took his gloves off and tossed them on the transparisteel surface. “As for my visits with the Captain, you’ve misunderstood the situation. It’s true that Phasma and I hold a personal relationship in addition to our professional one. She comes to my room regularly during our off hours, yes. We spar, for entertainment as much as combat training. We drink and chat, just as you and I do. She claims my quarters are much more relaxing than the officers’ lounges available on base. Do you find that to be the case? Would you like to know which of us takes the couch and which the bed?” Kylo was pale now, mouth open in dismay, and Hux went in for the kill, “Does the mere thought of me _fucking someone_ drive you mad? Do you need everyone else around you to be just as miserable and alone as you are? Phasma and I are not to each other’s preference, sexually, Lord Ren. Since you apparently must know.”

Kylo recoiled, burnt. His eyes stung, watered. “What is your preference?” He asked acidly.

Hux waved a hand dismissively, “I’m not discussing that with you.”

Kylo stared at him, poked at the back of his skull lightly, testing.

“Out,” Hux snapped, meaning it in every possible way.

“Tell me and I’ll leave,” Kylo offered.

Hux sighed deeply and leaned on the edge of his desk as he searched for the words, “I do appreciate a strong frame. Hardiness. Competence in battle.”

“Like Phasma,” said Kylo.

“Phasma and I share a love of many things, including our own gender, Ren,” Hux ground out of a stiff jaw. “Besides, it is against regulation for me to have romantic or sexual relations with those of a lower rank than myself.” He left it unsaid that there was no one on the Finalizer or on Starkiller Base that he ranked with.

“I’m your co-commander,” said Kylo obstinately.

Huh. Hux eyed him, a spark of heat igniting in his abdomen. Ren was outside the traditional ranking of the order. That was true.

“Are you offering yourself?” Hux asked, projecting amusement. Feeling much more.

“I’m hardy,” Kylo said, “And I’m...your own gender.” The Knight bit his own full lower lip with barely contained anger and embarrassment. And lust. You didn’t have to be a force user to see _that_. He was brimming with it.

Hux wondered how long that had been there, beneath the surface, and if Ren could read its echo on him just as clearly. Despite Ren’s abilities Hux doubted it. The man looked hurt and confused like a kicked akk dog. There was so much potential here. Dangerous potential, not to be indulged lightly. A chill of excitement and fear dripped it’s way down Hux’s spine. Oh, this was a very bad idea indeed. And yet. Hux would be lying if he said that Kylo Ren did not meet his exacting standards, in physical form if not temperament. The Knight was not much taller than himself, but twice his weight in muscle. And his face was achingly lovely.

“My men will recover your map. Do try not to embarrass yourself further.” Hux said, and gestured his door open for Kylo Ren to leave.


	5. Tether

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy, I don't think I have any trigger warnings for this chapter. As usual not beta read so sorry for mistakes, and sorry for the irregular posting schedule but my own schedule is weird rn with the pandemic and all. Thanks for reading!

It had started with a simple barb --  _ My officers spend almost as much time as you in those damned caves after we found the hot springs, Ren. If I’d known you were having spa treatments instead of shivering in an ice cavern I’d have given you more to do with your day. _ When the Knight had indicated in return that he hadn’t been to the springs, Hux had reserved them for himself in the following day’s schedule and requested First Order waterclothes sent to Ren’s quarters.

In retrospect it wasn’t surprising that Ren hadn’t taken advantage of the hot spring yet. It would’ve meant stripping his mask away in front of the officers. Hux hadn’t been yet, either, and his reasons were uncomfortably similar. It was too familiar to be out of uniform among his men. Hux preferred to stay on the imposing side of the management line. It wouldn’t do to be too approachable. So, if he had to lock down the entire cave system for a day to get Ren out of that blasted helmet then all the better.

They both made their way down the stone steps of the kyber caves now, having left the electric lights and durasteel hallways of the base behind two stories above. These stairways, though hewn from the obsidian native to Ilum, were remarkably even and bore no tool marks. Hux wondered silently if the caves had been shaped by use of the Force, but didn’t ask. There was no need to rile Ren up. The man was barefaced beside him, looking at the scenery around them intently as they descended. He really hadn’t been here yet.

This section of the crystal caves was a twisting latticework of black stone bursting with blue and green crystals. There were endless levels going down, illuminated by the crystals themselves. The vast majority of the crystals here were shades of blue. Cyan was perhaps the most common, flooding the space with bright light, but there were pockets of crystals that glowed more richly too. At the deepest reaches of the caverns visible to Hux, he could see hues of indigo and purple.

Hux found himself breathing deeper. There was a pleasant minerality to the air that made him feel light and refreshed even as they only approached the baths, which he had to admit were a spectacular sight. 

The hot spring baths which Order personnel had been making consistent use of were within an outcropping of stone in the mid-levels of the great cavern. Hot mineral water flowed down the stone wall in several waterfalls of varying size onto an obsidian shelf. The falls formed pools that glowed blue from the crystals within them, worn smooth by the passage of the waters over millennia, before streaming over the edge and into the crystalline abyss.

Nearly every black surface free of crystal had been intricately carved. The stairs and archways looking out over the caverns were a dizzying geometric pattern of triangles and diamonds. The shelf which supported the baths and the wall behind the thundering falls were marked with interlocking swirls. Altogether, it was breathtaking. Hux said as much.

“It's the work of the Jedi,” Kylo said. “This was a temple before the Empire claimed it. There would have been a ground level entrance, just as elaborately constructed. It was likely destroyed.”

“Is the area you’ve been meditating in like this?”

“The depths of the caves hold more power. Different types of crystals. They aren’t calming, they can be overwhelming. Especially to someone attuned to the force.”

Hux stopped short on the landing they had just reached. “You aren’t overwhelmed here are you?” he asked.

Kylo paused, considering the question in the obnoxious way he tended to when it was anything Force-related. “This was a Light place,” he said at length, “But it’s not unwelcoming.” His eyes met Hux’s. “I’m fine. Come on.”

They made the rest of the trek down to the pools in amicable silence, stopping briefly to shed their outerwear -- Hux tucked their shoes and both his coat and Ren’s cloak into the bag he’d brought to keep them out of the mist of the falls -- before they waded into the pools.

The water was steaming hot, a balm against the cool caverns, and they sank into it gladly. Ren submerged himself to the shoulders, closing his eyes in bliss. He had several scrapes and bruises that were visible outside the regulation waterclothes, a black tank top and knee-length leggings made from swim material. Hux felt rather exposed in his. He wouldn’t have lasted long here had the cave been full of his subordinates. He followed Ren’s lead and sank down, closing his eyes and letting the waters soothe him. Mist built up on his face, curled his hair and weighed down his eyelashes. The sound of the falls nearly drowned out the faint ringing that echoed through the caves. It sounded like a chime. No, a hum. No, a chime. It wasn’t unpleasant, to echo Ren, but it was strange. It seemed to bubble in his eardrums.

When Hux opened his eyes again he found himself looking into Ren’s. They’d settled across from each other and the man was unabashed at being caught staring.

“What?” Hux snipped.

“Your eyelashes are gold.”

“Good to know. Tell me about Jakku,” Hux prompted, leaning back on the wall of the pool with his elbows up. “You were rather nasty when you got back.”

Kylo sighed and ran wet hands across his face and over his hair. “They knew I was coming, somehow. It wasn’t enough to save them, but Dameron got away.”

“That name is familiar. Pilot, isn’t he? Flies like he’s mad.”

“That’s the one. He had the map stored in his droid. Even with some...some traitor tipping them off  _ I had him _ , and then…” Kylo breathed in through his nose sharply, anger welling up. Hurt welling up. Dameron was the closest thing his mother had to a son now. Perhaps he’d been that before too, even when Ben was alive. Dameron was the son Leia and Han had wanted. Charming, easygoing, smart. Good. Kylo screwed his face up and then relaxed, dismissing the feeling for now. There was nothing here that would be satisfying to destroy. He’d have to wait until he faced Dameron again. “I hate waiting,” he said aloud.

“There’s no use wasting resources chasing shadows across the galaxy,” Hux said, not for the first time. “They’ll slip up, and then we’ll have them. My network is robust, and eager to share information worth credits.”

“Have you gotten any closer to catching our spy?” Kylo asked. Losing the element of surprise on Jakku was a blow that still stung.

“I have a few suspects,” Hux said neutrally.

“None for me to interrogate?”

“Not yet.”

Kylo grunted and pulled himself out of the water to lean on the wall like Hux was. “The quicker you let me at them the quicker we’ll have our traitor.”

Hux hummed noncommittally and said, “What’s that ringing? I can’t quite place it.”

Kylo was taken aback. “You hear them? The crystals?”

“Is that what it is?”

“The crystals each commune with the Force in unique ways. They call for it, and for a user who connects with the Force in the way that they do. Force users, well, sensitives too, can hear them. When one is calling to you you can’t hear anything else. You’re force sensitive.” Kylo was looking at Hux as though he’d grown a second head.

“I am certainly not.” Hux scoffed at him.

“That must be how you keep me out of your head. I always thought it was a block on my part, something Snoke did, but it’s you. Do you know you’re doing it? Did you know you’re force sensitive?

“I’d rather not be,” Hux said drily. “On second thought, it must have been tinnitus. It’s fading now. Definitely not sorcery.”

Kylo splashed him. Hux spluttered, wiped his eyes and pushed his soaked hair out of his face, and then retaliated. He got one satisfying splash in before Kylo was grappling with him. They struggled, each trying to get the leverage necessary to dunk the other. Their voices echoed off the cavern walls, shouts interrupted by laughter. Hux realized suddenly that he’d never had this before, this parody of violence. Friendly sparring was still formal, and the skirmishes of his early youth had been all too real. A landing blow always split skin, often broke bone. It had never been...play.

In his distraction Kylo gained the upper hand, pushing Hux into the worn obsidian bench at the outer edge of the pool and settling his considerable weight into his lap. Kylo held both his wrists in one hand and scooped up water to pour over his head with the other. “Give up?” He asked leisurely.

“You started this,” Hux said, unable to properly glare as he closed his eyes against the water spilling down his face. Laughter rumbled in Kylo’s chest. Hux could feel it against his hands pinned there. Then Kylo released his arms, pawing at Hux’s face to help wipe the water away from his eyes, push his hair back. Once Hux was blinking up at him, Kylo’s hands came to rest on either side of his jaw. The Knight flashed his wolfish teeth in a broad smile and then leaned down, resting his forehead against Hux’s.

There was the sound of the falls and the crystals but over that there was the sound of Hux’s own heartbeat in his temples. There was the heat of the water but more present than that was the weight of Ren in his lap. He was breathing more Ren than oxygen and it was making him lightheaded. Hux was suddenly very sure that he was disastrously wrong in succumbing to this thing between them that was infinitely more than lust. The depth of it stretched out in front of him like a hall of mirrors containing a thousand images of himself and Ren, each reflection a buried sliver of emotion he couldn’t afford to dig up.

Ren’s forehead on his, his thumbs caressing his jaw, how could this be more intimate than any sex Hux ever had? Their breath mingled, intoxicating. Ren started this. Fine. Hux could finish it. He brought his hands up too, mirroring Ren’s grip on him. Touching his face, running his fingertips over the moles that looked like inverse stars. Hux tilted his head gently, slowly, tipping his chin up. Ren’s breath puffed against his mouth, a huff of surprise. His fingers tightened on Hux’s face and neck, trembling. Their lips brushed, a barely-there caress, and Ren jolted as if Hux had bitten him. Hux’s hands found the back of his neck, pulled him in for a second kiss. A real one. It was soft, hesitant. Ren’s mouth opened to him and Hux could taste him.

A thunderous CRACK echoed through the cavern as though the planet had split. It was followed by a high ringing, like someone running their finger along a wet glass. It wasn’t painful but it made their hair stand on end. Hux smelled ozone.

“Should we be running?” He asked against Ren’s mouth.

Kylo pulled back and moved off of Hux, shaking his head as though that would snap his mind out of its pleasant fog. “It’s a crystal,” he said at length, wading out to the edge of the shelf. Hux followed. They stood at the edge of the pools looking out over the abyss together, where something winked like a beacon in the dark. “Reach out your hand for it,” Kylo said.

Hux held his hand out over the cavern in an impression of Ren’s force-choke, feeling incredibly stupid. The feeling intensified as moments passed and nothing happened. Kylo moved behind him and pressed himself into Hux’s back, and whatever scant concentration Hux had was obliterated. Luckily he could let Kylo do the rock lifting. Kylo placed his hand behind Hux’s and Hux gasped. He could feel...something. A thrum of energy moving through his hand from Kylo’s. It was a pleasant pain crackling through each of his joints, like wiggling a loose tooth against bloody gums. He tasted ozone and iron. The crystal floated up and into their hands, Hux’s closing around it and Kylo’s around Hux. It’s voice faded.

The kyber crystal was black and glittering, warm like a living thing. It glowed low, a banked ember. It was dizzying to look at, and Kylo recognized it instantly. It was the color of their tether. The sight of it rendered physical, held in Hux’s hands, was as frightening as it was exhilarating.

“There’s a fault in it,” Hux said. “Right along the middle. Will this explode if I break it?”

“No,” Kylo said. “It’s very stable.” It was perhaps the most stable crystal in the cavern, he thought.

“Hm.” Hux carefully snapped the crystal into two much more manageable halves. “This looks like it would fit your saber. You should replace the cracked one with it.”

Kylo took the offered half and studied it, feeling it pulse at his touch. “Not quite. I’d have to build a new saber. Besides, it’s supposed to be red.”

“Thought you weren’t a Sith?”

Kylo ignored Hux, wading back toward their bag to put his half of the crystal in his cloak. It was disconcerting to look at. Once it was safely bundled into a pocket he turned back to look at Hux. The man was completely absorbed still, turning his half over and inspecting every angle. His brows were drawn low over his eyes as they did when he was focused on schematics. Kylo removed the length of cord from the hood of his robes and brought it back into the pool with him, wading over to Hux

“Here.” Kylo wound Hux’s half of the crystal carefully in the cord and slipped it around his neck. The gem was pulsed faintly every time it brushed either of their skin. When Kylo settled it against Hux’s tank he saw the golden hairs on Hux’s forearms rise briefly, as though from static. The crystal glittered against Hux’s shirt like a bloodstain in the dark. It whispered now, quieted but not sleeping. It was pitiless like a predator, impersonal like the path of a comet, intimate like a vow. It was power incarnate. It was  _ darkness _ incarnate, and like every void it was a mirror.

Kylo said, “You  _ are _ force sensitive. It called to you.”

“I think,” Hux murmured, “Objectively, it called to  _ us _ .” Kylo opened his mouth and Hux held up a hand to stop him. “Enough space wizardry for one day. Let me enjoy the bath.”

Takodana. Miserable jungle. But the Resistance was fond of such planets, so Hux should have guessed. He ordered a credit transfer to the contact who had provided the intel, and sent a comm from each of his datapads. The primary beeped first, of course. Snoke had been eagerly awaiting this news and wanted an audience now.

Hux took the elevator down to the largest communication chamber. Snoke preferred it, despite the fact that there was a perfectly serviceable one on ground level. The only possible reason could be that the alien had an affinity for using a hologram approximately thrice his own size. Force users and their theatrics.

He met Ren outside the communication chamber. The Knight removed his helmet and they nodded at each other before entering.

Snoke’s cratered face loomed like a strange moon in the vaulted chamber. “Well done, my General,” he rasped. “Kylo Ren, you will go at once to Takodana and retrieve the map to Skywalker. Destroy any rebel presence on the planet.”

“Yes, Master.” Kylo said, voice and face stony as they always were with Snoke.

Snoke turned back to Hux. “The weapon is operational?”

“Yes, Supreme Leader.”

“We must send a greater message to the Resistance than one razed outpost. You will fire the Starkiller today, after the conclusion of this meeting, on the Hosnian system as discussed.”

Hux could see the open look of shock and dismay on Kylo’s face in his peripheral vision. Only a lifetime of practice kept Hux’s own face neutral. “Supreme Leader,” he said evenly. “I had planned to fire it in two week’s time, to allow for preliminary tests--”

“Do you defy me, General?” Snoke interrupted.

“No, sir.”

“Then fire the weapon today.”

“Yes, Supreme Leader.”

“You are both dismissed.”

Kylo and Hux bowed in sync and filed silently out of the room as Snoke’s face watched. They walked haltingly to the elevator together like men walking to an execution chamber. The doors opened and closed, sealing them off from prying hologram eyes. The lift whirred to life and they ascended.

Kylo cursed abruptly and dropped his helmet to the floor. He engaged the emergency stop before turning and grabbing Hux by the shoulders.

“I will see you when I get back,” he said emphatically. Hux was pale, light gone from his eyes. In the stark white glow of the lift he looked like a corpse already. Kylo shook him slightly, said, “Promise me I will see you when I get back.”

Hux’s eyes flickered, locked with Kylo’s, “Promises are empty from a man like me, Ren. I didn’t take you for a fool.”

“And what if I am? I know I am. I’m foolish and I’m weak and,  _ and I don’t care anymore. _ Hux, please, I...I can’t bear the thought of you hurting yourself, and me not being here….Promise me,  _ fuck! _ I’ll take an empty promise, I just need you to say it,” Kylo broke off, took a shuddering breath, and released Hux’s shoulders to punch the wall with a resounding clang. The white lights within the durasteel flickered.

“Is that enough? The elevator has a control panel. Smaller than your usual targets but it will have to do.”

“Snoke has always seen me for exactly what I am.”

Hux’s voice was icy, lethal. Angrier than Kylo had ever heard him. “He’s wrong about this and he’s wrong about you. Commanding  _ my _ weapon, I’ve planned everything and he just-- and, and YOU. Has he ever once told you what you’re doing right? He doesn’t  _ see _ you,” this last a hiss followed by a slow breath. “He doesn’t see either of us.” Hux shifted to tap out the restart sequence for the lift. It rattled a complaint and then carried on its way. Seconds ticked by in silence. Their floor approached. They stood, two black forms side by side in a white box hurtling toward their inevitable separation.

Kylo spoke first, voice low and rough with barely contained emotion. “Hux, please.”

Hux answered without looking at him, voice rapid, words coming out in a rush. “I can’t. You want me to promise you I won’t die? I will. By my own hand or by another’s, today or next week or next year or the year after that, every minute of my life is my potential death. We are at war. We’ve both taken too much life to pay it off with our own. Do I need to  _ explain death _ to you?”

“There were Sith lords who cheated death.”

Hux turned toward him with such ferocity that Kylo expected a slap. “You insufferable  _ prick _ ,” Hux snarled, and kissed him. It was everything that their embrace in the pools hadn’t been. Their teeth clicked painfully once and then Hux was biting his lower lip, tugging it. Kylo’s hands closed on either side of Hux’s throat, fingers digging hard into the back of his neck. Kylo surged forward, deepening the kiss, licking into Hux’s mouth. It was over almost as soon as it began. Hux pulled away as the elevator chimed.

“There’s your promise. Goodbye. Good luck.” He stalked out of the widening doors and took a right toward the control room, already calling for the nearest officer to summon the others. Kylo shakily retrieved his helmet from the floor and put it on, starting his own walk to the docking bay. He resisted the urge to simply stand in the hall and stare after Hux until the man disappeared from view, as though taking a purposeful last look would tempt fate against him.


	6. Starkiller

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW -- suicidal ideation, details at bottom notes.

"Today is the end of the Republic! The end of a regime that acquiesces to disorder! At this very moment, in a system far from here the New Republic lies to the galaxy while secretly supporting the treachery of the loathsome Resistance. This fierce machine which you have built, upon which we stand, will bring an _end to the Senate!_ To their cherished fleet! All remaining systems will bow to the _First Order!_ And will remember this… _as the last day of the Republic!"_

Hux could make a rousing speech in his sleep, and he almost feels as though it’s what he’s done. It feels separate from him. He is all-consumed with his anxiety. For years of his life he has assumed that the firing of this base will be his own death, as if it is a simple fact, unavoidable like an expiration date and impersonal like a durasteel wall in front of a speeder.

He made his speech in the cold light of day, and ordered the weapon charged. The sky turned red and then black above him as Ilum’s sun was harnessed. He gave the order to fire from the command center, felt the planet shake with the strength of the beam, and thought impulsively of Ren. He hoped against all reason that Ren would be spared the feeling of this colossal destruction, knowing that the opposite would come to be. Ren would feel _this_. Hux was barely attuned to Ren’s precious Force and he could feel it the moment the planets were struck, trillions of lives winked out.

It was an ache in his bones, as though they were being hollowed out from inside. He clutched the railing in front of him to avoid falling to his knees. His vision blurred. He grit his teeth and stood, holding himself up in place until the officers around him relaxed, began to shout and celebrate their victory. His victory. He excused himself as graciously as he could then, and walked to his quarters on trembling limbs. He barely made it into his room before falling, and crawled to his refresher on his hands and knees.

Hux was exceedingly grateful that he made it to his toilet before his vomiting commenced. Once his stomach was empty even of bile, he hoisted himself up at the sink, rinsing his mouth and splashing his face with ice-cold water. Then, Hux looked up and appraised his reflection.

A dead man stared back. He was wane, paler than usual. Lips bloodless. His eyes were dark, the light gone out of them and purple shadows beneath them. Hux unholstered his blaster and rested it on the edge of the sink until he felt he could lift it with his shaking arm. He brought it to his temple and looked himself in the eyes. Was there anything worth living over again, if this was it?

The answer came easy. _Do you feel passion in my presence, Lord Ren?_ The guileless look in Ren’s dark eyes. His answer, _I do._ The heat of Ren’s skin mingled through the fabric of his shirt as Hux rested his head there. With Ren’s face in his mind, the crystal beneath his uniform came to life and pulsed warmly through the fabric of his undershirt. The blaster came back down into the sink, heavy, and Hux crumpled to the floor.

He registered that there was noise before he registered that it was him. General Hux sobbed harshly into the silence of his refresher, letting himself sink down, heavy, to the floor.

The words hit Kylo Ren like a bolt to the brain.

“You’re afraid that _you’ll never be Darth Vader_.” 

Kylo reeled away from the vicious scavenger in front of him, her snarling face and bright eyes and her _mind in his mind_. He had felt her the moment he set foot on Takodana, a presence that had always been with him but now had a body, a heart and racing thoughts. She regressed him in a way that was painful-sweet. When her presence brushed his, he remembered his calligraphy set. The meditative practice of ink on paper. A lost art reborn reverently. She was powerful, more powerful than she had any right to be. She matched him. Only her lack of training had allowed him to subdue her. When the Hosnian system had gone the loss in the Force knocked them both flat, but she had recovered slower, and he had gotten her. Brought her here.

Snoke had said that Luke was the last Jedi, and here was living proof against that. She shone brighter than Luke, brighter than anyone Kylo had ever witnessed. And she was from nothing. There could be limitless others like her out there, evading notice. Killing Luke would not be the end. It would never end. The altar to Snoke in Kylo Ren’s mind crumbled. He shrunk away from her, stormed out of the room having left rushed directions with a pair of troopers to watch the girl for him. His foundation was cracked, falling away with nothing beneath. He needed something solid, something real. He grasped at the crystalline line in front of him, pointing out from his heart, and felt it in his joints when his hand passed through it, like he was wiggling the bones in their sockets. It was real. He followed it down halls and up a flight of stairs, breathless. _I need to see him and then it will be okay I just need to see lovely-dark-hatred-lust-mine I feel he’s alive but I haven’t seen his face just let me see his face and I will feel okay again--_

Kylo came to a sudden halt when he turned the last corner and the command center came into view, just behind a set of durasteel double doors.. He could feel Hux here, alive and healthy at least in body. Hux’s presence in the Force was another matter. It was watery, thin. Sick. Still he stood at his post, directing his forces against the rebel onslaught. They needed to leave. It was too late to turn the tide, and Hux must realize that, so what was he waiting on? _Me?_ The thought was pathetic, and Kylo dismissed it. They needed to leave. He took another step forward, and stopped again.

There was already a Resistance presence on base, planting bombs, a presence… his father’s presence, Kylo realized. And the scavenger girl was with Han. He’d been a fool to leave her with a stormtrooper. The third presence, that of the traitor, was only another reminder of that. Her grasp of the Force was fledgeling but strong, and now she was reunited with the Resistance. With the man who was a father to every lost whelp in the galaxy except for the one he had sired. Rage burned in his blood, and he turned away from his path to follow their force signatures. As if sleepwalking he followed their bright silhouettes across the base. They led him to the dark building where the thermal oscillator was held. He entered it silently, a shadow among shadows.

The room leading out of the thermal oscillator toward the cliffs was just as quiet and dark as the rest of the building, but Kylo sensed that Han Solo and his accomplices were close. They had landed the Falcon nearby. Kylo walked slowly across the ramp toward the base exit. He would stand in their path and meet them here.

“ _BEN!_ ”

Han’s voice stopped him cold. For better or for worse he sought this out. It is time, at last, to face it. Kylo turned and removed his helmet to lock eyes with his father.

“Ben,” Han said again. “It’s time to come home, son.”

“Your son is dead,” Kylo said. “I killed him.” Ben Solo had died in the temple, with the other padawans, replaced by something dark and striving.

“My son is alive,” Han said gravely. “Please. Come _home_.”

 _Home isn’t with them anymore. I don’t fit, home is...home is…_ He should have followed the tether to Hux. “I’m being torn apart,” Kylo choked out, “I want to be free of this pain. Can you help me?”

“Anything,” Han stepped forward at once, and Kylo saw that he meant it. There was nothing Han wouldn’t do to ease his suffering. His father looked at him in all his dark potential and accepted all outcomes, like a martyr. It was too much. It was -- his hand unclipped his saber from his belt and held it out to his father. Han moved to take it, to rid Kylo of the weight of it. _Snoke will kill me,_ Kylo thought in alarm, and he saw in Han’s face that his father had heard him. In his anxiety, Kylo was projecting. Han took the blade end of the saber’s hilt, and moved to press the activation switch himself.

Kylo waved his other hand, lifting his father and sending him tumbling off the ramp. He heard a terrified scream. The scavenger girl -- she looked on from above as Kylo tossed the man she saw as a father into an abyss. Han landed below, barely visible in the gloom. Alive -- Kylo felt it -- and unreachable. Safe from him. In the next second his side flared in agony. Bowcaster. Chewie had shot him. Kylo fled.

“Come on,” Rey made to chase Kylo Ren.

“Wait!” Finn stopped her with a hand on her arm. “Han’s alive. He’s alive, he’s moving. I’m going to go down and get him.” He looked Rey in her face. “You can’t face him alone.”

“I have to,” Rey said. “There’s something there, I can’t explain it but I need to do this. I’ll be okay.”

Finn held her there for just a moment, searching her eyes and deciding to trust her. He handed her the saber. “You’ll need this, then. You better be right.”

Rey made the jump down to the ramp and sprinted out into the night after the man who had once been Han Solo’s son.

Black trees against black sky and white snow beneath. This planet was like a nightmare. It blurred like one as Kylo staggered forward. This injury would kill him untended, he felt. He had made a mistake in seeking out his father. Snoke would call it weakness, to stand across from Han and not kill the man. Kylo wasn’t sure yet if he agreed. Would Hux think it was? Hux, who had killed his own father so mercilessly, without regret? Kylo didn’t know what Hux would think. He knew what the man would do. Hux would hesitate to offer his thoughts on the matter. He’d deflect it, turn the conversation away. A mercy. Not because he didn’t think Kylo could handle the subject but because he didn’t want him to have to. Stars, Kylo hoped he would see Hux again before death took either one of them. The tether was still here for now, still glimmering in the dark, a glass thread in the air reflecting the snow below it. If it was going to break Kylo hoped he would go first.

In pain, breathing loud, stumbling forward toward nothing, Kylo Ren almost did not hear the rapid footsteps behind him as they crunched in the snow. The approaching blue light of the scavenger’s blade cut through the fog in his mind, saving him. Anakin’s blade. Kylo could feel it call out to his blood. The scavenger had caught up with him and he hardly brought his saber up in time to block her swing. Red and blue blades arced off each other, lighting up the snow around them. If he wasn’t injured, Kylo might have bested the girl quickly, but the seeping wound through his ribs shortened his swings and slowed him. Though untrained in saber combat as well as the Force, she was a worthy foe. She wielded the saber — by rights, his saber — almost as if it were a staff instead, reaching out gracefully with it to counter his blows, to drive him back.

Between bouts, Kylo pounded on his injury with his fist, sharpening the pain to clear his head of its turmoil. Finally he pinned her by a drop-off. “You need a teacher,” he said. “I can show you. I can show you the Force.” He didn’t need Snoke. He didn’t need to sever his ties. He needed this, this connection. They could teach each other. This girl was as strong in the Force as Kylo was, his mirror image. His twin. They were made of the same material.

“You’re a monster,” she hissed at him, and there was as much rage in her as there had ever been in him. As much rage in her as light.

“REY!” It was the traitor’s voice. He had emerged from the oscillator building just before the first detonation, supporting Han over his shoulder as they walked together.

Kylo froze, locked eyes with his father again, then with the scavenger girl. Rey. Her face was set, eyes fierce. He hesitated, dropped his saber slightly as he gazed at her. Like any warrior would, she saw the opening and took it.

Pain overwhelmed him. It seemed almost to happen in reverse: his body hit the ground, then the hilt of his saber was destroyed along with three of his fingers. then blood seeped into his eye, then his flesh split open from forehead to clavicle, then she swung. _She could have killed me,_ he thought, clasping his hands, one of them mutilated, to his face as it contorted in pain.

 _You could have killed him,_ she answered. _You didn’t._

The ground split apart between them, chasm widening to the point where even uninjured Kylo wouldn’t chance the jump. The ruins of his saber and his missing fingers were lost to the abyss. The thermal oscillator’s wing of the base dissolved into flame as more bombs sounded.

“--- no way to --- can’t reach ---felt the light, there’s light—” The silhouettes of Rey and the trooper and his father swam in front of the flaming remnants of the thermal oscillator. Kylo couldn’t decipher the words. They were leaving, boarding the Falcon. It lifted off and shot out into the black sky where Ilum’s sun had shone only hours prior, before it had been harnessed.

His side was on fire. His face. The planet. It had all gone up in a matter of minutes. Another explosion shook the ground, rattled his eardrums. Heat blasted against his face. _Likely the fuel cells_. Kylo closed his eyes against the brightness of the burning base and sank into the welcome cold of the snow.

The planet was breaking into pieces. Hux’s grip on the back of the pilot’s seat was hard, white-knuckled as the shuttle flew low over twisting treetops and deep fissures. Magma glowed orange in the depths of some of them. He thought erratically that Ilum’s surface looked like some giant incarnation of Ren had gone at it with a lightsaber beam the size of Starkiller’s laser.

Hux had composed himself just in time to return to the command center when the Resistance attacked. He’d been in the midst of commanding the TIE units when the first explosion had rocked the base. He hadn’t needed the system to tell him it was the oscillator. The resistance had engineers after all. Any one of them should have been able to look at a schematic and pick out the fuel cells as a weak point. How they’d managed to get on base without him knowing was a different matter, but there’d been no time to fume over it.

The pinpoint of Ren’s tracker on his datapad grew closer as they approached the ruin where the thermal oscillator had been, and --

“There! Land in the clearing.” Hux ordered.

Even after the shuttle landed it didn’t feel secure. The ground was shuddering. Hux stalked down the shuttle’s ramp with three troopers behind him. There had been a fight here. The trees were marred with more than the planet’s upheavals. Saber marks scarred them in vicious slashes.

In the midst of destruction there was Ren, looking every bit like the carnage he usually left in his wake. His face was bisected by a burnt gouge, his side bleeding profusely into the snow. If not for the blood he could have been a part of Ilum’s landscape, rendered in black and white. His face was frightfully pale where it was clean. Hux ran across the snow to Ren without feeling a single step he took. He couldn’t feel his body at all. He fell to his knees and shook Ren’s shoulders, said something, shouted without hearing the words.

“I’m okay,” Ren’s voice was weak, a horrid croak. Hux had never heard anything so lovely. He kissed him briefly, not caring about the troopers watching, not caring about the blood and grime that was now coating his own face too.

“Help me get him to the shuttle,” he ordered the nearest trooper, and together they hauled Ren up to his feet.

They’d barely settled Ren into a seat and buckled his prone form in when the pilot took off -- _no more time to wait, sir, hold on_ \-- and they broke atmo just as Ilum sank into its own core. It would become a star, Hux thought, gazing out the back viewport.

Twenty years ago Hux had sat at a worn desk in a steel box by the sea and learned that much of the human body is made up of stardust, insofar as every element besides hydrogen is. The lesson had been less inspirational than it was meant to be, to a planetbound teenager studying under the ghoulish light of an algae lamp, unable to catch a glimpse of the stars at night through the constant cloud cover.

Today General Hux had returned trillions of bodies to stardust with a short speech and one command. Hosnian Prime alone had boasted a population of 1.5 trillion, a teeming planet-wide city containing the entirety of the Galactic Senate and the financiers of the Republic, and there had been five other planets in the system. Watching Ilum collapse with most of its two million First Order officers and troops unevacuated, Hux wondered at the weight of so much stardust measured against his own life.

He took a deep breath and turned away from the viewport. Grabbed Ren’s hand and slid the glove down enough to feel for a pulse. It was slow but there. Hux kept his fingers pressed against it for reassurance.

 _It’s over, the Resistance has been dealt a killing blow and the war will be done. It will end_ , he thought, and it brought him no solace.

“There you are. I asked for you an hour ago.”

Hux never thought he’d be relieved to hear Ren’s voice whining at him. It was strange, also, to see Kylo Ren surrounded by so much white. The man probably wouldn’t have allowed them to drag him into the medbay had he been conscious when they arrived at the Finalizer. Instead he had been dead to the world, pale and burnt and bloodied, floating along on a gurney and then deposited in a bacta tank. He’d been suspended like a ghost in that horrid tank for two days, hooked up to a ventilator and endless wires, his wounds a sickly and mottled black through the blue gel. Hux had queued up the video feed of the room on his datapad so that he had it available to check throughout the day, which quickly became every ten minutes. Supervising Ren’s removal from the tank and seeing the man breathe on his own again had been an enormous relief.

He was looking much better now, Hux noted approvingly. He had some color back, and it wasn’t just the juxtaposition of his skin against the white sheets. The scar on his face would remain there for the rest of his life. Hux had the sneaking suspicion Ren had refused further treatment for it, but other than that he seemed nearly healed. Ren responded to his once-over with a wave of his hand — the one which sported three bionic fingers now.

Hux took a seat next to the bed and lit himself a cigarette.

“Are you allowed to smoke here?”

“My ship,” Hux murmured around his first drag.

“What took you so long?”

“I do have a job, Ren. It involves making decisions, and I’ve had a lot of them to make this week. The Finalizer only barely cleared the blast when Starkiller went. She needs repairs before we can move. Snoke was not pleased with the timeline I gave him for our rendezvous.”

“We’re going to the Citadel?”

“His orders were for me to bring you to him to complete your training.”

Kylo was quiet for a moment, dark eyes boring into Hux, searching. “You’re afraid,” he said. “You think he might kill you?”

“Failure does not uncommonly result in termination in the First Order, if you hadn’t noticed, and I have failed...mm, _spectacularly_.”

“It was my fault. I underestimated the girl. I’ll make him understand.”

“It wasn’t your fault.” Hux took a last drag on his cigarette and stubbed it out on the arm of the chair as a medical droid whirred to the doorway to beep at him.

“You don’t blame me?” Ren’s face was blank, stunned.

“You knew there were intruders on my base, _in the oscillator room_ , and did not tell me,” Hux said sharply. Ren cringed away. “But, no, I don’t blame you. Except for the fact that I’m here now. That _is_ your fault. It would have been customary for me to go down with the base.”

“Don’t even joke. How did you find me? Did Snoke tell you where I was?”

“I had a tracker installed in your belt years ago. Like a pet collar. Snoke didn’t contact me until we broke atmo.”

“So you hauled yourself and a trooper unit out into the forest to get me without a direct order,” Ren said, “And you’ve kissed me a lot recently.”

“Three times is not a lot. That applies to rifle practice and to kissing. They have the same principles.” Hux told him primly.

“Three times is a lot. You _do_ like me. Tell me you like me.”

“If you make me say that aloud I shall be forced to kill you.”

“Is there anything you would like to say to me? If not that?”

Hux looked at his hands, clasped between his knees, leather tight over his knuckles. He started slow, considering his words as he said them. “I meant what I said about you being a blunt instrument in a fight. But I would like to tell you that...it’s beautiful. I always thought that true beauty comes from discipline so I was disgusted by myself when — The first time I saw you in the fray, Ren, I thought you were beautiful. Savage. But beautiful. Even with that disgrace of a saber. I may even, entirely against my best efforts, tolerate you.” Hux stood, flustered by his own admissions, and made to leave. “I have another meeting. I’ll be back after.”

Kylo wasn’t sure that he hadn’t just split his face open anew by smiling, but made the offer anyway. “I’m all patched up, actually. They’re discharging me to my own quarters tonight. You know, if you wanted to meet me there. Blow off steam. I can handle it, I promise.” Kylo pulled the sheet down to show the healed-over scar on his side. Pink, but no longer raw.

Hux paused and looked him up and down, verifying Kylo’s health in the first pass and taking more time with the second, lingering over his exposed chest. “Very well.” He said, and was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW -- Hux again contemplates suicide and, in the absence of the poison, holds his blaster to his head. He does not attempt it.
> 
> Also disclaimer --- obviously feeling bad after destroying a star system doesn't absolve Hux of having done it. He's still Bad. One more chapter after this, the next one is the smut one so skip if you don't want. Sorry for the delay on these and as always, not beta read. If there are any mistakes and you have the time to let me know I always appreciate it.


	7. Union

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is plot in this chapter but there is also porn, this is what the explicit rating is for. Just a warning!

Hux presented himself at Ren’s room after his last shift, feeling dead tired and in need of a shower. He struggled to stop the list of repairs that had been circling his head all day. They could wait until tomorrow. The door opened at his signature. The Knight was seated in the middle of his floor, meditating. Hux set his hat on Ren’s desk, where there was scattered metal and Ren’s half of their crystal, and hung his greatcoat on Ren’s chair.

“I put clothes for you in the bathroom,” Ren said without opening his eyes. The clothes were one of Ren’s long undershirts and loose leggings. They were big on him — the shirt was practically a nightgown falling off one shoulder — but they were clean and he was glad for something to change into. He folded his uniform neatly and added it to the desk.

Kylo got up and crossed the room to stand before Hux. He was already in similar sleep clothes, Hux saw. Kylo was fidgety, nervous. Hux tilted his face up and Kylo took it in his hands. “I offer myself to you, my body, my virtue. If you’ll have me.”

Hux leaned in to Kylo’s touch, biting his lower lip and then fixing his eyes on Kylo’s, pupils blown wide. The full impact of what Kylo had said hit him. “Your virtue? You’re a virgin?”

Kylo scowled, “I’ve been busy.”

“I didn’t ask for a justification, Ren. It doesn’t matter. And with the millions of ways sentients have sex in the galaxy the human concept of virginity is antiquated,” Hux said. He felt a brush against his mind and hissed, “Oh you will stay OUT of there. During. Always. But especially during. I can’t have a brute like you knocking around in it, it’s quite organized.”

“You’ll only share what you want,” Kylo promised. “As usual. You’re quite good at keeping me out.” He said, voice almost petulant.

A thought rose to the forefront of Hux’s mind, shimmering and teasing, _I want you_. A broadcast meant for Kylo to pick up on. Kylo exhaled shakily.

 _I want you too,_ Kylo sent back, offering the thought rather than forcing it, _I’ve craved you for so long. Every awful fight we’ve had and every quiet evening, it never ceases._

 _Take me to bed,_ Hux told him. Kylo bent and picked him up easily, Hux’s slim weight barely laboring him. “Wait,” Hux said aloud. “The refresher first, I think. Put our best feet forward for this.”

“For my benefit?” Kylo said wryly.

“For mine,” Hux quipped, “You’re disgusting. This oily hair. And you smell. Unacceptable.”

Kylo fully laughed then, swinging around toward the refresher. He set Hux on the counter, the lights and ventilation flicking on automatically. He started on Hux’s socks, before Hux kicked him in the shoulder.

“You first, Ren,” Hux demanded. “I want to see what I’m dealing with before I commit fully.” It was a lie, but for Hux it was a fun one.

Kylo slowly fumbled his clothes off in front of the General’s piercing green gaze. He pulled his shirt up and off in one motion, noting the waves of approval pouring off Hux once his broad chest and arms were bared. He started to roll down his waistband, and paused. “Call me Kylo,” he said. “Ren is...it’s a title. My name is Kylo.”

Hux considered him, silently, and his mouth quirked up. “Kylo,” He said, “remove the rest of your clothing.”

“Yes, General,” Kylo said, smiling back at him, eyes crinkling at the sudden flare of lust he felt in Hux.

“Hmm,” Hux said, licking his lips. “You can stick to General, for me. That will do quite nicely.”

“You won’t tell me your first name?”

“Clothes. Off. Now.”

Kylo removed his leggings, feeling anything but sensual as he rolled them down and discarded them, but the heat coming off of Hux amplified as if he had walked off of a climate-controlled ship into the hot sands of Jakku. Hux’s eyes were roaming his body admiringly, dipping over the spots and scars and muscles with rapt attention.

“You’re better than I dreamed. Kylo,” Hux purred, and Kylo felt his face color even though it seemed most of his blood was directed steadily downwards. His cock began to fill, standing up just barely off his leg, dripping.

“Now you,” He said, kneeling to pull off Hux’s socks, baring his porcelain feet. Kylo kissed each one and then moved his hands up to clasp Hux’s waist. Hux was slim without his layered uniform and coat on, a slimness that Kylo at once knew Hux despised as shame soured the waves of lust coming off him.

“No, don’t,” Kylo said, “You’re so handsome.” Hux made a small noise of disagreement and Kylo pressed on, “You are! You’re so...lithe. You move faster than the other officers can keep up with when you spar. I’ve seen you. And you’re the quickest draw with a blaster.”

“Okay, enough,” Hux groaned at the praise. The shame dispersed from the air, replaced by something new, something that Kylo had not tasted in years. It nearly knocked him flat. Was this genuine affection? He continued to undress Hux, his hands trembling just slightly. He got his shirt off, running his hands over Hux’s chest, gently marveling. “Beautiful,” he murmured. He traced the black crystal still hanging on its cord, and it glimmered darkly at his touch. “Leave this on, I like to see you wear it.”

“Get on with it,” Hux said, but there was no bite to his voice. He tilted his hips up, supporting himself on his hands so that Kylo could remove his leggings for him, which Kylo did with a flutter of excitement. Kylo’s mouth fell open once he’d gotten them off, and Hux kicked his shoulder again. Kylo caught his bare foot there and kissed his calf sloppily before looking up at him.

“All of your hair’s red. Isn’t that unusual?”

“It is,” Hux preened. “Among all of humanity, at least. Not on Arkanis.”

“Let me kiss you again,” Kylo demanded, already pulling himself up between Hux’s legs and pulling him close by his shoulders. “Can you feel our bond too?” he breathed just before he sealed their mouths together.

Heat flared between them, almost painful, the near swipe of a saber. Hux’s mind opened to him, the surface whirring with what Kylo had just said, and Kylo fell in. He saw the rocky black beaches Hux had grown up on. He could taste salty sea life hunted and consumed from their shells by small white hands. He could see the hulking steel manor by the sea that Hux had called home, the stern gaze of an older man, his copper hair faded.

“Useless,” the man said, “skinny and useless just like your mother.” The mother in question was not the equally pale and auburn woman beside them, but a kitchen maid from another system, unknown to Hux. She had died bringing him into this gray world that Brendol Hux called home, his race of people scattered like white and red glints of flame along black sand and cliffs and dark seas. Hux looked like them, which only doubled Brendol’s affirmations that he was not. The stern face grew pale and then blue, the vessels in its eyes breaking, and then it sunk in and rotted, exposing a toothy skeleton grin. Hux’s amusement flared, _I killed the kriffing fool before his wife could pop out a true heir, and I took his name and his estate and I put his wife in the kitchen where he plucked my mother from_.

 _Your mother_ , Kylo thought, and his will pressed out on instinct, a muscle frequently flexed along the familiar path. He saw Hux, fiery hair glowing in the light of a window in Brendol’s study, breaking into a large locked desk drawer at the bottom of his father’s monstrous bureau. He saw a holophoto ignite in Hux’s pale fingers, of a woman with dark hair and pale green eyes, and those eyes were steely with resolve like Hux’s, her form lithe and sinewy like Hux’s, muscled from martial arts training like Hux’s. Her clothing was not that of a scullery maid. She wore combat fatigues. There was more in the drawer. Papers with symbols that meant little to Hux and were blurred in his memory. Documents of his father’s, a failed program to train force sensitive children from birth. An old communicator, not Order made. Perhaps it would function with a fresh power cell... and in the back of the drawer, a helmet.

The memory was darkened, the lights blown out and a sheet tossed over it. Young Hux disappeared, and Kylo was shoved out of Hux’s mind. _Stay out!_

 _I’m sorry,_ Kylo told him _. I didn’t mean to pry._

 _Stay away from that, just...for both our sakes. Let me keep that for myself_. Hux’s mind whispered. He nudged Kylo again, back to physicality. His mouth felt like heaven. Their lips melded together as if they were made for this. Hux broke apart first, always the more controlled, and Kylo nearly whined. “We were going to freshen up,” Hux reminded him. Kylo retreated to turn on the water of the fresher, noting that Hux still looked shaken, his face nearly translucent.

“I’m sorry,” he said again, aloud.

“It’s alright...I was...I was showing you. Part of that. I wanted to. Just...stay away from her. It’s complicated, and personal. I’m sure you understand.”

“Yes,” Kylo said at once. “Yes. Water’s hot.”

They stepped into the fresher together, and Hux got to work lathering them up with soap. It wasn’t regulation, likely pilfered from some distant outpost. It smelled of spices and citrus. He washed himself, fire-bright hair dampening to a subtle glow like banked coals under the stream of water. Then he fixed his gaze on Kylo. “Kneel,” he said, and methodically washed and rinsed Kylo’s hair for him. Kylo’s mind went wonderfully blank as Hux’s fingers massaged his scalp. “There,” said Hux once the soap was rinsed away. “You won’t look like such a womp rat.”

Kylo opened his eyes and pressed an adoring kiss to Hux’s navel before standing. “Use the mat,” Hux told him when it looked like he would neglect it, and they stepped out onto it to be quick-dried under the heat lamp and blow-dryers.

Kylo’s hair felt light and airy, and he was vaguely worried he looked ridiculous, but Hux...Hux was gorgeous. His hair was tousled from the dryers, strands coming down into his face instead of slicked back against his skull. It was intoxicating to see him so different from how he looked on the bridge. Heat pooled like lava below Kylo’s navel. They had both been standing at half-mast consistently, but Kylo’s cock now stood up nearly fully, flushing deep red-purple, leaking profusely down the shaft and dripping clear viscous precome onto the clean bath mat. “I want to fuck you,” he said.

“Yes. Obviously,” Hux smirked over his shoulder and he left the refresher. “You’ll need to prepare me of course...I intend to enjoy this, and you are quite large.”

Kylo followed him, “Just tell me how. To, er, prepare you.”

Hux reclined on Kylo’s bed, fixing Kylo with a disgusted sneer that he was exhilarated to give. “Tell you how,” he drawled in a mimicry of Kylo’s accent, “Stars forbid I stop giving orders. It’s like being at work.” his voice dripped acid, but his mind nearly glowed with adrenaline and lust. Kylo knew what Hux wanted, after five years working alongside him, but he was loath to scrape and bow. His mouth quirked unhappily, pride protesting.

“Haven’t you had your fun?” Kylo asked, crawling into bed on top of Hux and nipping at his belly, his hipbone.

“Nearly,” said Hux, spreading his legs obligingly. Kylo leaned down, his hot breath ghosting raggedly between Hux’s thighs. He nuzzled into Hux’s left thigh roughly, kissing up it and then repeating the process on the other side, and it was almost too much, it was too sweet — Hux cried out in alarm and pain as Kylo gave his right thigh a savage bite on the tender innermost flesh. Hux gasped as pain flared and faded, immediately replaced by aching desire. He closed his thighs on Kylo’s face and twisted Kylo’s neck so that his head was held down to the side, dark hair fanning out on the gray sheets. Kylo’s big hands came up to grasp Hux’s thighs, running slowly up and down the taut muscles.

“Stay out of my head,” Hux warned him again. “You will do as I _say._ ”

“Wasn’t in your head,” Kylo said between his legs. “Was barely skimming.” And then, voice dripping lethal sweetness, “You asked me to bite. You were being loud about it,” Kylo licked his lips.

Hux released him, rolling onto his back once more. “Oh hells, that mouth is obscene. Just get to it, Ren. Kylo.”

“Yes, General,” Kylo said, and went this time straight to business. Kylo’s fingers petted the line of copper hair below Hux’s navel almost reverently as he licked a long stripe up the underside of Hux’s cock, tongue lingering over the head of it before he took it in his mouth and sucked. Hux moaned, unable to contain the sound. Kylo repeated the process, his tongue leaving no part of Hux untouched in those torturously slow passes. His hips bucked sharply, involuntarily, every time Kylo’s hot tongue laved over the tip. Whether he picked up on that with one of his five senses or with the sixth one, Kylo noticed, pressing down with delicious pressure every time his tongue reached the end of its path up, just before he engulfed Hux in his mouth. Hux’s breath came in deep gasps, and his thighs shook. His hands moved to Kylo’s head, fisting that absurd black hair. Stars, he couldn’t come like this, from these slow strokes, but he was already so close. His orgasm mounted in him, thighs shaking. It grew like a ball of lightning below his navel, ready to shoot out and light up his every nerve.

 _Kylo_ , he thought, reaching out with his mind despite his earlier warnings, _Kylo I’m going to come oh kriff I’m close—_

Kylo grabbed Hux’s hips in his huge hands and pulled Hux into him, bobbing his head down further, blessedly further and faster. Hux tightened his grip on Kylo’s hair and forcefully pulled him off just as he was on the shuddering edge of orgasm. He saw stars. His mind opened like a transport door. He was unable to hold it shut. Kylo choked and let out a sobbing noise. He crawled up Hux’s body to hold him, resting his face on his chest, mouthing at his neck.

 _Oh_ , Kylo’s thoughts appeared in Hux’s mind, a swirling mess of pleasure. And then warmly, tightening his grip, _I did this._

They saw stars together. Hux was joltingly reminded of the thousands of times they’d stood on the bridge together, looking out at the expanse of space. At their empire. Of course, on the bridge they didn’t lay in a shaking, sweating pile together.

 _We could_ , he thought. _It’s my kriffing ship. I’ll order everyone out_. Kylo laughed breathlessly against Hux’s neck, pressing soft kisses against his jaw.

 _It’s maddening_ , Kylo told him, kissing up his face and licking into his mouth as they shook together, _your thoughts are so wonderful, when you send them to me. I want to devour them all._

Hux realized that all his defenses were down and struggled to raise them again, the shields around his mind stuttering, not coming up. Icy panic wound through him, dampening his pleasure. Kylo felt it too.

 _I won’t_ , the Knight promised hastily. _I’m not, see?_

He wasn’t prying, Hux had to admit. Kylo’s mind was next to his but not diving in, only drinking deeply of what was offered. Hux was afraid, though, of what he might send out on the next wave of pleasure. “Ren,” He said, pulling out of their kiss. His voice was rough as if from disuse. “There are...many things I’ve hidden from you. And I am practiced, at hiding. Trained, really.” He could see that this piqued Kylo’s interest but he forged ahead. “But none of my training involved...this.”

“Did you train with Snoke?” Kylo asked eagerly.

Hux grimaced, “Don’t bring his name into bed with me,” he snapped. “I’m trying to say that I am...unused to being undefended.”

“I’ve been good,” Kylo told him.

“You have.”

“What are you afraid of? I can sense it. It’s bitter. Don’t be afraid of me while we do this.” Kylo said, pleading. “And use my name. I want you to say my name, not my title.”

“Kylo,” Hux said. “I’m not afraid of you.” And it was true, though it shouldn’t have been. Stars, it shouldn’t have been. He wrapped his arms around the larger man’s shoulders, and then wrapped his legs around his hips, pulling Kylo flush against his chest. Kylo’s erection pressed insistently into his thigh, reminding them of his need. Kylo shifted, centering himself on Hux’s body and rutting against him, groaning low and loud, and of course he’d be loud wouldn’t he? Infuriating. Hux’s heart fluttered worryingly.

“There’s no point in you humping my stomach like a teenager.” Hux said, “You’ll waste your stamina.”

“Yeah...” Kylo said roughly. “What, uh, what should...”

“Lube,” Hux told him. Kylo’s bedside drawer opened and a bottle flew to Kylo’s outstretched hand. He coated his fingers studiously and then met Hux’s gaze. “Is this...is this position okay?” Kylo seemed shy again, especially for someone who had nearly licked a planet-shattering orgasm out of Hux only minutes ago. Hux shifted on his pillows, getting fully comfortable, and spread his legs anew, lifting his knees up.

Kylo’s slicked fingers found his entrance and traced the rim before one pushed in. Hux hummed low in his throat, enjoying the feeling of Kylo’s exploration.

“Another,” Hux said, and Kylo obliged. “Scissor — ah! Yes, like that. Another.”

“Are you—“

“Yes I’m sure, if you want me to tell you what--,” Hux gasped when a third finger was added. Kylo wiggled them around and slid them in and out, pressing the pads of his fingertips against Hux’s front wall and sliding in as deep as they would go, and, “Kriff!” Kylo froze and Hux nearly whined with need. “Right there, it’s so good,” he groaned.

“Oh! Okay,” Kylo said, repeating the motion and sliding his fingers against Hux’s prostate until he was gasping and flinching up off the bed.

“Okay, enough...it’s enough. Kylo, fuck me. Slick yourself...”

Kylo squeezed more lube out of the bottle, coating his dick liberally. He braced himself on his hands over Hux, trying and failing to get the angle of his hips right. Hux huffed in annoyance and reached down, correcting Kylo’s angle, smirking when Kylo panted at the pressure of Hux’s hand on his cock.

And then Kylo breached him and his mind shorted out. The stretch drew an embarrassing sound from his lips. Kylo slid into him in one slow thrust, pressing in completely, amplifying the pleasant burn into Hux’s depths.

 _Okay?_ Kylo asked.

Hux pulled him down to devour his mouth in response, moving his hips as much as he could beneath Kylo’s weight. Kylo pulled out slowly, and Hux moaned when the head of Kylo’s cock stretched his entrance again, squeezing his muscles around Kylo without entirely meaning to. Kylo slammed back into him, pressing him down into the bed. They established a rhythm, bed creaking, each of them breathing harshly. Their gasps were out of sync, a cacophony, but when they moaned or whined they did it together, flares of pleasure arcing off their minds to each other. The air filled with a droning buzz audible even to Hux.

 _The Force_ , Kylo thought between thrusts. _The Dark Side._

 _Shut up,_ Hux told him. _Infuriating mysticism._

Kylo’s pace quickened. His mattress creaked with each thrust. That ball of lightning was forming again, hot and fizzling below Hux’s navel. His nerves were on fire. His chest shook with deep, fast breaths. He could feel Kylo’s length in its entirety as he pulled out, stretching the ring of muscle around Hux’s entrance, and as he pushed in to the hilt with each thrust, the head of his cock hitting that perfect spot and making Hux moan at the end of every thrust.

Kylo’s hips stuttered once before he recovered the rhythm, and Hux knew he was close. The idea of that, of Lord Ren who had held him off the ground by his throat with a thought, who had needled him with insolence in front of his crew, and wrecked more than one of the Finalizer’s consoles in his tantrums, reduced to a gasping sweating mess as he fucked General Hux with total abandon...Hux cried out, a debauched sound that reddened his cheeks and chest with shame. The lightning coiling inside him did something it never had before. It burst, but instead of dissipating through his body as he came, it intensified. He was hot, white hot, and he felt the sensation he had before when Kylo had pulled the crystal currently tied around his neck to them, except it was everywhere. Every joint in his body crackled with sweet pain like wiggling a loose tooth in its bloody gums. He tasted iron and ozone. His stomach dripped with his spend. He clenched hard around Kylo Ren as the last of his orgasm shuddered through him. Through them. Hux had pushed his pleasure out, more than broadcasting it for Kylo to hear, he had pushed it through the faint shimmering link between them — and how kriffing long had that been there? — into Kylo’s mind.

Kylo stiffened, muscles going rigid as he slammed fully into Hux again, and then he moaned. It was low, animal. Hux felt Kylo’s cock twitch inside him. Kylo thrusted, his movements smaller than before, not withdrawing. Rocking deep into Hux as he spilled, overflowed. He buried his face in Hux’s neck, taking great weeping breaths.

They rode their aftershocks together, and it was like floating in the dark seas of Arkanis as the rains hit your face. A gray world, more water than land, more water than air. Hux would float in the seas near the Academy and near the estate he’d inherited, letting the drizzle wash over his face as his body hung below the surface. He would let the waves rock him. It was Kylo rocking him now, their sweat and release dampening his skin, Kylo’s tears dampening his face and neck with salt. Kylo was shaking still. Hux pushed again into his mind, grabbing hold and tugging backward, this time sharing not lightning, but the waves. He pulled Kylo back into his mind with him, pulling him into the sea to float together. Kylo calmed, wracking sobs slowing to a stop. They rested. Hux pulled up images from his home for Kylo to muse over as the Knight went soft inside him. Kylo was particularly interested in the storms that shook Hux’s steel manor, of the savage waves breaking high upon black cliffs during foul weather. His home planet of Chandrila had no naturally occurring dangerous weather patterns.

 _I was born in a thunderstorm_ , Hux told him. _It drowned out my mother’s dying screams._

Kylo offered up a series of images. Hux realized with a start that he was seeing General Organa, with a black-haired toddler in her arms. He saw Kylo Ren with his mother.

 _Ben_ , Kylo told him. _She named me Ben Solo, after Uncle Luke’s old Jedi master_. Kylo’s childhood flashed before Hux’s eyes in a series of images, starting bright and ending in darkness.

 _My mother named me_ , Hux said. _It is a mother’s right on Arkanis. Even though she wasn’t of our seas_ . Kylo waited, rubbing soft circles on Hux’s shoulder with his rough fingers, kissing the corner of Hux’s mouth gently. _Armitage_ , thought Hux at last. _She named me Armitage. I took my father’s name by force._

“Armitage,” Kylo said aloud, and the name sounded rusty from disuse to Hux’s ears. “What does it mean?”

“It means...well, alone. Solo.” Hux said, and Kylo laughed against his skin.

“I like it.”

“Don’t call me by it in front of the crew,” Hux admonished.

“But I can call you by it in here?” Kylo asked, and Hux tensed. He pushed against Kylo’s chest, and Kylo rolled to the side, sliding out of Hux’s body in a way that felt strange since he’d already softened.

Hux sat up on the edge of his bed. He was sore and unpleasantly wet. He sighed into the quiet room, the only noise now the whirring of the air filtration system. The droning of the Force had faded. “We shouldn’t do this again,” he said.

“What?” Kylo sounded more awake now, voice tinged with alarm.

“That was an unfortunate lapse in judgement.” Hux said, cold as the vacuum of space.

“But—“ Kylo spluttered. The room pulsed with flashes of his pain and anger. “Didn’t you feel THAT?” He settled on.

Hux let his shoulders slump, leaning forward over his thighs with his hands clasped in the middle. “Ren,” He said evenly, feeling the air reverberate with emotion when he forwent the Knight’s first name, “I felt...laid bare. Which is not something I can allow.”

“You accuse me of being cryptic and here you are,” Kylo said, shifting and moving to the edge of the bed to put himself back in Hux’s view. “Clinging to the shadows with half-truths and secrets, turning away from love—“

“Love?” Hux spat. Kylo reeled back from him. “Men like us don’t love,” Hux told him. He felt Kylo delicately picking around the edges of his mind, and glared at him.

“Love is the darkest thing there is in the galaxy,” Kylo said at length. “It’s selfish. Dangerous. Hate and love are a dyad in the Force, and when applied from one being to another, individuals, love and hate burn together in the Dark Side.”

“If you are implying that I love you—“ Hux hissed, and Kylo cut him off.

“No. I’m implying that I love you.” Kylo’s voice was soft and terrible. Hux wished Kylo would hit him. Destroy something. Do anything but look at him with those wet dark eyes. One of Kylo’s characteristic tantrums would be convenient just now.

Hux hit Kylo instead, a punch connecting soundly with the scarred part of Kylo’s face. He pulled back and hit again and again, Kylo’s chest and shoulders and face, with all the strength he could muster in his lean frame. He bloodied Kylo’s already-crooked nose and mashed those enticing lips against his teeth. Kylo reacted slowly out of shock, having been dragged out of the warmth of Hux’s body into the icy tundra of his anger. Finally he fought back, sending Hux flying across the room with a thought.

Hux crashed heavily onto his desk, scattering the items on it to the floor and then rolling off the other side himself. He landed on his datapad, cracking the screen. Kylo stood, his form hulking in the low light, wiping at his bloody face with his hands, breathing raggedly.

 _Hurt me_ , Hux broadcasted at him, _fight me._

Kylo charged. And this was a familiar dance. Hux did not often leave himself in the position to spar with Kylo. While the Knight’s martial arts form and technique were atrocious, in close quarters he ripped through his opponents using speed and brute strength. Strike, block, strike, block, strike, dodge. A strike to his face broke open Hux’s cheekbone. A heavy blow to his shoulder bruised his clavicle. Then Kylo kicked him in the stomach, an underhanded move. Hux went down, grappling with Kylo as he did, bringing him down on top of him. They breathed like that for a while, bleeding onto the floor.

“I hate you,” Hux groaned, feeling at his face.

“I know,” Kylo said breezily, smiling a bloody but entirely self-satisfied smile.

“Oh shut _UP_.”

“I felt the way I made you feel.” Kylo insisted, rolling aside to look at Hux. “I’m not an idiot. There was love there. There was so much we could have. Love and hate are entwined in the heart of the Dark Side. You’re burning for me. And I for you, Armitage.”

“We can’t have it. Any of it. Anything but this,” Hux hissed back at him.

“Why?” Kylo demanded.

Hux grappled for another reason, “Snoke. Snoke will kill me. He won’t want his precious Knight rolling around in my sheets professing his love for me.”

“He won’t kill you,” said Kylo. “I wouldn’t let him. I’d kill him if he tried.” Hux went dumb at that, and they panted together in angry silence, stretching to test their forming bruises, letting this ultimate treason hang in the air between them. Hux’s mind swirled with it.

After what might have been an age or a minute, Kylo reached over and pulled Hux gently toward him. Hux let himself be guided to Kylo’s chest. He could hear the steady pulse of Kylo’s heart. Kylo spoke. “Tell me. Tell me what you’re afraid of. If it’s Snoke—“

“Kriffing hells, Kylo, it’s not Snoke. Not really. I can’t tell you anything, you’d kill me.”

Kylo jumped, stiffened. “I’d never!” He protested, cupping Hux’s chin to draw his eyes up.

“You almost have!” Hux countered. “You’ve beat me and choked me and—“

“You’ve done all that to me!”

“—and if you could pick through my brain at your leisure you’d have run me through with your lightsaber five years ago!”

“WHY do you think that?!”

“Because _I’M THE SPY!_ ”

They both went silent, fuming. “You’re not the kriffing spy, I would have sensed it,” Kylo said stubbornly.

“Oh my STARS, Kylo, you are so thick-skulled it’s a wonder you can sense anything, especially with that toy helmet on top!”

“You built Starkiller from nothing. You destroyed an entire system,” Kylo muttered. “Tell me why a Resistance spy would do that. If you defected they wouldn’t take you.”

Hux laughed abruptly at that. “I built it to be destroyed itself, blown up just as it was. Snoke ordered the test early. The Resistance was supposed to have another two weeks to stop it.”

“You built it functional.”

“I couldn’t not build it functional!”

“Because the Order would know, or because you would?”

“Both.” They stared at each other in the dark.

“You’re a terrible spy.”

“You’re not going to kill me, are you?” Hux said. Kylo shook his head. “At least,” Hux intoned, “You’re predictable in that nothing is ever easy with you.”

Kylo’s hand found Hux’s throat and rested there, hot on his skin, slick with a combination of blood and sweat. He pushed up against Hux’s jaw gently. “Look at me,” he said. Hux did. Kylo drew him in for a kiss, both his hands coming up to cup Hux’s face. The kiss was soft and gentle, tasting of salt and metal.

“Damn it, Ren,” Hux broke away first, fixing Kylo with a haunted look. “I’ve been moving in circles too long. I don’t belong anywhere, not the Order and not the Resistance. You’re right that they wouldn’t take me. I’m dead here and I’m dead there, and neither option is likely to be quick. If you think you have any...any love for me at all, you won’t stand between me and a death of my choosing.”

“Call me Kylo. Please,” Kylo murmured. “And stop talking about the Resistance, and spies. Put your shields up again. Reinforce them. I won’t breathe a word of this. Snoke won’t see a hint of it in my mind. I swear that to you.” They laid in each other's arms for a while, adjusting to the weight of everything that had been said.

“Okay,” Hux whispered. “But first...Kylo. Here,” he pulled Kylo’s forehead down to meet his, as though physical distance would strengthen the connection that glinted between them. Hux had a feeling it would be just as strong across the galaxy. He opened his mind, and tugged Kylo in as before.

This time Kylo found himself not in the salty waves outside but back in the manor, watching Hux pry open the drawer and pull his mother’s tokens out of it. He removed the Holophoto, the papers, and the helmet. He examined the helmet, running his hands over the battered surface. White helmet, yellow visor, red symbol. The starbird of the Resistance.

Younger Hux set the helmet down and seemed to survey the room before picking up the old communicator and switching out its fuel cell with the one in his father’s more recent model. It crackled and hummed to life, and he stared at the glowing blue holoscreen for a moment before messages loaded.

He responded to one. _She’s dead. She was my mother. My father was in the First Order and I’m a cadet. I’ve killed him. Tell me what to do._

He set the communicator aside and began to clean the mess, dropping his mother’s artifacts down the chute in the wall to the incinerator. He had just cleared his father’s things into the drawer and locked it up tight again, when the communicator chirped.

The image blurred and darkened, fading away.

Kylo took a hitching breath as he sank into his body again.

“General Hux,” he said, “You are full of surprises.”

“Armitage,” Hux corrected him gently. “When we’re in here.” Kylo’s responding embrace was crushing, his bloodied smile wide and ridiculous. The crystal around Hux’s neck gleamed. It was darkness incarnate, and like every void it was a mirror, and like every mirror it reflected Light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much for reading! This is a much softer take on Kylux than some of my other stuff (although I'm incapable of making them Good), and yes this fic was completely inspired by that I'M THE SPY line in TROS because I audibly laughed at it in the theater and then my mind started turning about how to make that plot point more believable. And now here we are!


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